Fascinated by the way photography can make you observe and approach the world in many different ways, Liu Liu has been focusing on cultural and identity-related issues from the very beginning.
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Through the experiences of investigating my subjects by taking photographs about them, I would confirm or deny my inferences which are based upon my research work, the camera is a portal for me to examine and discover. - Liu Liu
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Chinese woman living in the U.S., Liu Liu followed an interesting personal and professional path, starting as software engineer and then trying to pursue her dream of being an artist. In the end, that is what she did: she moved to Chicago becoming a student within the local Institute of Art – school of Photography – where she had the possibility to develop and show her creative talent.
Fascinated by the way photography can make you observe and approach the world in many different ways, she has been focusing on cultural and identity-related issues from the very beginning. This was influenced also by her peculiar situation of being an Oriental woman living in a Western society. That is why her pictures’ subjects are often (but not just) still lifes showing silent details harmonically and chromatically organised and structured. Her most recent project, entitled “Template of Ideal Homes”, aims at illustrating the interior design work accomplished by Liu’s mother (who is not a professional) within her relatives’ houses. The result is a sort of iconographic documentation reflecting specific tastes, habits and, in other words, cultures and ways of living.
Liu Liu has participated in several solo and collective exhibitions mainly in the U.S. and Europe since the beginning of her artistic career. She has been awarded of several prizes and scholarships such as the “Fred Endsley Memorial Fellowship” (2017) and, most recently, by the “Runner-up winner of Photo Alliance Home Show” (2018).
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Author Silvia Colombo
L.A.: Liu can you tell us a little bit about yourself? When and why did you choose to move to United States?
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Liu Liu: I was a software engineer, I moved to the United States 4 years ago, then I became a student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago to study photography.
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L.A.: What inspired you to study photography?
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Liu Liu: I got my first DSLR about 10 years ago, from that time on I became more and more interested in photography. As I quit my job as a software engineer, the change in life made me decide to pursue my dream as an artist.
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The Cross
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Grandparents
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L.A.: What do you like most about working with the medium of photography?
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Liu Liu: I enjoy the process of observing the world around me with my camera, photography helps me to approach things with curiosity, it is a great tool to accumulate my ‘statistics’. Through the experiences of investigating my subjects by taking photographs about them, I would confirm or deny my inferences which are based upon my research work, the camera is a portal for me to examine and discover.
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L.A.: Can you tell us a bit about your project "Template of Ideal Homes"? What led to this project?
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Liu Liu: My hometown city has built a new development area in recent years, and my family members bought apartments as their new homes in this area. The interesting fact is that my mom suddenly became the "interior designer" of the big family. She designed and decorated my relatives' new homes. Although she doesn't have any professional interior designing experiences. The idea of "home" is gradually forming during the process of designing it, especially for my mom, since she lost her parents when she was a kid, and then was adopted by her uncle. So I decided to document the homes that my mom designed.
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L.A.: How does this project relate to other work or project you have done?
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Liu Liu: I have always interested in the concept of "home". In order to figure out what hometown means, another project I did was about my father’s hometown, I went to my father’s hometown to take photographs of things and people which are both related and alien to me.
L.A.: What are you busy doing in this period? Have you any future project?
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Liu Liu: For the future I will continue photographing family members and their homes.
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The Blackboard
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Liu Liu http://www.liuliu.photography
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