This is where I belong

Lots of people like me who work or study in a foreign country experience moving from place to place without long-term residency. Our belongings are more boxes than the content we carry in them, as we travel from place to place like nomads. Always on the move in an infinite loop, a singularity where the final destination is there while also somewhere else. The experience of not having a home coupled with the feeling of not belonging often brings sadness, and infusion of doubt as we second guess our choice and the path we are taking. In this diptych work, I want people to view the experience from another perspective. I created a vivid illustration with bright colours and scattered objects floating in the air to create a vision of our dreams - the dream about travelling, about experiencing life outside of our comfort zone. These boxes are fragments of our dreams we carry with us to the empty rooms, that are waiting for the new lifestyle and dreams to fill them with. The silk floating across the two images creates a bridge of connection.

The collection of the objects in this work has been with me from place to places in the past few years, they’ve been packed and unpacked from the boxes multiple times, each of them has a memory grafted to them. In the construction of the image, multiple photos of objects such as the boxes, floating scarf and flowers are taken separately, later being added as components. Bright colours are added on objects and as geometry to symbolize the joy I have found in taking these boxes to new places and meeting different people. The scattered composition in this work creates a sense of separation and connection of the objects and their storage, at the same time, it symbolizes deconstruction and reconstruction of one’s life journey.