somewhere between : memories misplaced
Raised on both sides of the Pacific in Taiwan, Hong Kong and the United States, I’ve never been either fully American or fully Chinese, but rather somewhere between. So arriving in mainland China has always been an odd sort of homecoming, feeling at once strangely and entirely familiar yet altogether foreign.
So then after returning from China I am always curious to discover where I trained my lens. For me, temples, lanterns, and other typically Chinese scenes on which many may focus recede into the background. Instead, as someone engaged with the culture but not with the people, I become an impartial observer. I see vignettes of a changing China, landmarks disappearing in smog or with time, culture and lives and lifestyles torn down in great swaths to make room for the generic and new. I see the pains that accompany modernization: pollution, overcrowding, inflation, disparity. And I see that life goes on for the Chinese people, standing hard amongst the hectic change, living in the balance, somewhere between.
memories misplaced
Memories Misplaced pairs the poems of Wai-lim Yip, written in response to each photograph, with the series Somewhere Between. This collaboration follows the successful pairings in Paris: Dialogue. Unlike that work, where both Yips approached Paris from a similar perspective as visiting flaneurs, Wai-lim Yip’s connections to China are understandably stronger than the younger Yip’s, and the resulting poetry weightier. Both Memories Misplaced and Paris: Dialogue are included in the book Somewhere Between (along with another series, A Fertile Darkness).
