Metamorphosis
A photo essay on Identity Rebirth
Metamorphosis’ Surreal Mindscapes taps into a ‘Dream Machine’, the portal connecting past to the
present, dreams to reality. Surreal landscapes serve to narrate a tale of a
shape-shifter, who has landed onto foreign shores, finding her self lost in a Dreamtime journey of discovery.
Metamorphosis
narrates a universal tale of a journey of
self-discovery through encounters of foreign places and tensions between
adapting to new cultures and retaining old cultural ties, which no longer
exists in the physical world but only in memory. The Real
and Unreal emphasises the process of Migrants living more in their
imagination, which tries to combine two disparate worlds together.
The Cultural displacement narrative expressed through surreal depictions of foreign landscapes also references the
Migrant’s inner mindscape terrain that is consumed by Cultural translations and Identity Reconstruction.
Self-portraiture
in Metamorphosis involves a role-playing game of
‘seeing’ and being ‘seen’. This power of being ‘seen’ engages the viewer
as a voyeur to a depiction of a private existence. As a migrant myself, my
story is intertwined with many others to create a universal tale in which all
cultures may relate to.
The Childhood wonderment of discovering New Lands was
the basis of Metamorphosis’ visual language, sparking
memories of my own childhood experience of migration. Like stepping stones, my Grandparents
settled in Indonesia from China and the ‘Red’ thread continues its journey to
sew itself onto new foreign shores, with the future Generation migrating to
Australia. These Cultural Transitions had formed a rich tapestry of Cultural
influences woven within my Identity and also encapsulating the Chinese Diaspora experience.
Nostalgic dreaminess is captured in the image ‘Eastern Blindfold’ the woman looks forward to the future, leaving her past Eastern cultural
wardrobe behind. She chooses to see the past or the present, standing between
the ‘blindfold’ that separates the two Cultures like a hazy nostalgic veil.
Metamorphosis
summarises the Identity Rebirth experience, in which the essence of past
Cultural heritage remains embedded within the Migrant’s identity, creating a
unique dual existence that tries to find harmony between the two seemingly
disparate worlds of East and West.