People Watching (2019–20)

Artist statement

Life is full of sunrises—a line colourfully printed on the back of a white T-shirt worn by a kid, who is chasing soap bubbles in a waterfront park on a Sunday afternoon. That is one of the scenes I remembered from people watching—the kind of social situation where I find myself comfortable and easy to fit in. I can’t help making up stories about people while observing their appearances, gestures, and sometimes interactions on the streets. But the attempt to share those observations through pictures would inevitably, using painter Francis Bacon’s words, “deepen the mystery” of whatever stories that came to my mind.

Before I realized myself as an introvert, people watching has gradually become a habit of mine. This series began with the intent to keep a visual memory of my people watching experience, during which I’m also specially aware of my own state of mind. The more I engage in people watching, sadly, the more I’m confused about the purpose of almost everything in life—as if I’ve fallen into a temporary state of existential crisis. Pictures in this series depict people from different walks of life on the streets of my hometown, Hong Kong. I found in them some visual clues to an unfamiliar aspect of everyday street scenes in a fast-paced, socially diverse city in Asia today.