Residence In Homelessness (2017)

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In August, 2017, I came to New York, United States, a place 13500 kilometers away from home, as a freshman in college by myself. With all the premise- eight years studying at an international school and more than ten countries traveled- I still had a hard time adjusting to the environment. As I experienced uneasiness and unfamiliarity in everyday life from the food, the weather, the way people talk, and the way the life is lived, and as I realized the difficulty of relocating myself comes from all the tiny little things in life, I started to wonder how much we used to and have to invest in the physical world to shape a seemingly solid self.

 

Is there a way of life that do not have to depend on a specific location, taste of food, style of buildings, or habit of word use? Is there a way for a person to be communicated and understood without barrier among different cultures? Is there a self when all these graspable things are diminished? ... ...

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As all the questions raised in my mind and as my intuition went, I explored around the new environment, took pictures, and eventually came up with this series. Each formally connected diptychs are contributed by two photos taken at different places and time. And this series is accompanied by a short paragraph below:

 

Sense of belonging, true self, and shelter, we exhaust our whole life looking for them. We wander, seek, struggle, and yet, fail to realize that wherever we go, there we are. 

What if there is no place where we can live forever, what if there is no meaning for whatever. 

 And what if none of them actually matters, when we can perch and leave, like migratory birds; when we can sing and sing, until we can’t utter another word; and when we can hug and kiss those lovers, of whom the love is the only thing eternal, ever. 

So and so, residents of homelessness, to all much ado about nothing, we say never. 

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