Until You Left Off Dreaming About
Until the early 2000s, before the advent of smartphones, our waiting rituals were markedly different. At elevator banks, subway stations, in classrooms we'd arrived at early, or on streets and in cafes before appointed times, we didn't bow our heads to smartphone screens. We just simply waited for somebody. This series likely owes its existence to that era – a time before smartphones, when I was young and most eager to learn, living exclusively on campus without a car until graduation, ensconced in a on-campus dormitory in LA.
Upon my arrival in the United States, I was struck by California's distinctive laid-back ethos, its pervasive positivity, and effortless sociability. "So this is America," I mused, resolving to immerse myself in learning. One of them was making eye contact with stranger encountered by chance, greeting them, and asking how they were doing. After a year of consistent practice of my small talk skills, I started to find myself feeling uncharacteristically ill at ease in those fleeting moments of silence while waiting for an elevator, standing mutely beside a stranger. During that period, I'd often initiate conversation with a slightly self-conscious smile, typically resorting to observations about the weather – a conversational gambit I had catalogued as quintessentially American. By my junior year, my social metamorphosis was such that I could confidently engage in dialogue about subjects that had once both intrigued and intimidated me – striking up conversations about elaborate tattoos, flamboyant hairstyles, or eclectic fashion choices with genuine admiration and curiosity; “Oh my god, I love your shoes!”
Those who initiated conversations with an alien like me during fleeting moments of silence with strangers were mostly fellow newcomers like myself. Perhaps that's why many of them responded to my brief greetings with conversations longer than usual. Often, these exchanges would stretch on, and in those instances, I would listen to tales of the places they had left behind. Stories of an America I had only seen in movies and had never visited, and the lives of people inhabiting those lands. One day, while returning to the dormitory after spending an extended afternoon break in conversation, a sudden realization struck me. "I never learned that person's name, yet I now know things about them that even their parents or close friends might not." Intriguingly, we can often be more honest with those we may never see again.
During that time, someone I met said, "If you're curious about my hometown, you're welcome to visit during Thanksgiving." Another, dressed to the nines and on their way to a club, suggested we go together that weekend if I hadn't been before. But I was the kind of boring model student who would say, "I would love to, but sorry, I still have homework to do." For many holidays, I rarely ventured beyond the library and my dormitory. However, the scenes I had imagined while listening to the stories of strangers would flicker through my mind like a silent film; while taking a momentary break from studying to gaze at the sunset outside the window, or feeling a breeze carrying peculiar scents as I walked, or watching the Independence Day fireworks in the distance between the school buildings.
This series was created during my convalescence at home in the summer of 2023, following a major surgery. Using prompts inspired by my imaginings from that period, I generated these images through Midjourney, an AI image generator. The operation was near my heart, and in the brief period between examinations and the decision to operate, it felt as if my life story had been suddenly finalized. Perhaps because of this, in the moments before sleep, I often found myself recalling landscapes I'd never visited, inspired by stories from strangers.
Someone's brother living in a place that required a ten-hour journey by plane and car, has the same tattoo as his younger brother living in LA. There is a motel standing isolated on a roadside in a hometown where "there was nothing." There was someone who once worked in a small shop and adjoining pub on the motel's ground floor, and “endlessly gazing out the window, dreaming of leaving the town.” Someone saw her “very first Christmas trees” in New York, which were not with palm fronds, but laden with snow. Someone’s story of downtown club on Friday night. I pondered: had I, in my early twenties, chosen to pack a bag and embark on a journey instead of completing exams or part-time jobs, might I have captured such photographs? Hence these landscapes represent a nostalgia for something that I have never had. Confined to bed during recovery, I ceaselessly painted worlds with words in my mind, wondering how long this exercise in imagination would persist. This contemplation led me to the quote I chose as the title: "Until You Left off Dreaming About"
The phrase that came to mind is a quotation found in Borges' The Circular Ruins; originally from Lewis Carroll: "And if he left off dreaming about you…"
307 images of the project are published as a photobook format,
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