Life in Shadows

The Artist started paying attention and photographed shadows for years. He has seen much work with long shadows but often found himself left in ambiguity. Through this series, the photographer tries to cross boundaries between street, candid, fine-art, and narrative in one single series. He is determined to illustrate his conceptual development project without any of the staging element nor digital manipulation unlike most fine art photographers. Life in shadows Qing scholar Ji Yun says the ‘Shadow never leaves us’. That is to say, the Shadow is always a part of us, a part of our lives. Light shines upon us with a gentle touch of warmth, inviting the shadows to come alive. Shadows before sunset are trapped in a dilemma, in a state of transience. Appearing in their longest and freest form, yet ready to leap into darkness in a moment. One late afternoon in the fall of 2017, light crept in between the alleys next to my apartment, quietly orchestrating a dancing performance in which shadows broke through their comfort boundaries, mingling with each other. This series of photographs show shadows in the concept of ‘fixed-explosive’ – being static while preserving their dynamism; at one and the same time, in motion and at rest. A set of photographs of shadows represents various journey in life: Maturing and Aging, developing Friendship, falling in Love, discovering and growing from Severance, forming a Family, belonging and contributing to Society, and practicing Individuality against mainstream. Relationships here are boiled down to the purest form – vanilla plain and free from distortion. They are a part of our lives with which we never live without, as Ji Yun suggested.