I made a bunch of objects. Sometimes they can be worn, sometimes they frame a space, and sometimes they serve as tools to create something else. But beyond these possibilities, I won't forget that they are, above all, simply things that carry my narrative.
I shape my narrative by putting new flesh into an old form. A chair crafted from fiber captures the depth of touch; Bedposts cast in iron anchor memories; wax buds stand frozen, forever on the verge of blooming. Under the form of familiarity, the flesh of something foreign is growing. I know it’s something, yet it’s not quite that thing anymore.
It becomes a riverbed for memories.
Memories need to hold onto something solid, for they are always as elusive as mist.
Like the morning fog that drifts over the river in my hometown of Chongqing—hovering just above the water, weightless and silent. You cannot touch it, nor catch its scent. Only when you return home do you notice the fine droplets clinging to your hair.
When an object enters your sight, touches your skin, those once-blurred emotions and images begin to take on shape and weight. The object is not the memory itself, but the vessel where it can temporarily reside and converge. A chipped arm of an old angel sculpture, a tiny patch on a piece of clothing, a stone worn smooth by years of touch—each carries memory within it, waiting for the moment we glance back.
Objects complete the parts of memory that words cannot reach. They preserve not only our memories, but also the version of ourselves that lived in them—how we touched, how we gazed, how we longed, and how we lost.
A river needs a riverbed.
Everything we touch, use, or cherish is the riverbed—ourselves included. I am the riverbed, holding all my responses to the world, flowing and writhing ceaselessly. My ceramic stones hold all the touch that the original stone experienced, along with my admiration for their beauty.
I espy another riverbed, laying on the couch of my childhood home. My grandmother, with all her responses, merging gently hers into mine. As my porcelain stones shrink in the kiln, I see her body shrinking too. She is fired by my growth, by the time that slips away in each glance from my eyes to her aged skin.
All the things I made are like scattered slurry, slowly filling in the remaining gaps of memories, until it becomes solid and whole again. And the memory itself shapes the form of my work, finding its way to inhabit. So, there’s a certain moment when a ring finds its finger, a dust cover finds its body to protect, a spoon finds its hand to be held.
In my hometown, Chongqing, the wrinkles of the elderly all carry the same river that has nourished us for generations. Their bodies hold the fishy scent of river water, and after death, they become the silt at the bottom of the river. Their souls merge and keep flowing—until they find a new body.
All those objects I make, run like a river through me. They shape me the way I shape them. We are chasing and guiding each other’s footprints. And I won't forget that they are, above all, simply things that carry my narrative.