This series of fruit portraiture represents a nostalgic representation of my childhood, under golden day's end.
My absolute favorite thing about this series is that it's all from my past - the vases and the frames that were stacked in my parents' rooms under dust, the abundance of fruit and the red hues that dominate what we eat.
When we were growing up, and even now, we didn't really travel anywhere. But we saved money for fruit. Our house always had lychee, plums, cherries, dragonfruit, guava, bell apple, oranges, strawberries...and let your mind go on.
No matter what turmoil we had, we could all join together at the table, even in silence, and eat fruit. So perhaps it was a crutch we would lean on to keep on through the bad moments, but what a bittersweet, healthy thing to keep us sticking together.
I wanted to create a happy visualization of what each pluck of a fruit at our table at home felt like. It wasn't exactly bright and joyous. It was spotlighted, sun beaming into specific corners of our turmoil.
The fruit perfectly bounced the light a slight bit more to us, and with each bite and each hand reaching for the next nectarine, we'd very slowly dissipate the anger we held at the table.
It was quiet chaos of parts that have all come together, all growing and shrinking together enshrouded by warmth and light.
In all my work, I'd like for you to feel like you can taste the art in your mind, savor the light, sway in the wind, live in the seemingly effortless way things fall together. To do so, I perform part of myself into a visual feast, but without refinement.
Life is so much about performance, not simply in the main dish but more so in the details we honor the main event with. It's so much in how we prepare the foundations so that after all the spotlight is shed, there is still a performative foot print.
And naturally, we are continuously rearranging our stage.
