Topography Practice

Along the desert, through the Gobi, across the mountains, bypassing the valley, is a piece of green land. Scattered residents have settled down in various villages by the mountain. The villagers of each town promised to return to the original site where they lived 27 years ago. Grazing sheep, galloping horses, and dog-fighting tournaments, is it the joy of reunion or sacrificial delight?

Fragmented coastal scenes scattered across the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area: a security guard on duty at a Shenzhen beach, a woman posing for bridal photos along the West Kowloon Waterfront Promenade, children playing in the shallows beneath a bridge, the transparent glass interior of the M+ Museum, the rooftop of Sky100, the upper reaches of the Pearl River, and the waterfront of Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong, among others. Most of these filming locations were chosen from lists of photogenic sites popular on Xiaohongshu (RedNotes), i.e. places that have become “internet-famous” through a single viral post, attracting waves of photographers and tourists. Yet the artist deliberately diverges from these original images, turning away from the sharply defined details and edges of these celebrated sites. Instead, the camera retreats into marginalized zones at the limits of visibility, areas suffused with blinding halos of light.