Photography

 

 

Visual imagery, from my perspective, is the most appropriate expediency to transcend invisible yet unneglectable distances and deliver the shared memories between the me and the Wa people. Originating from visual instincts, imagery offers an unparalleled immediacy and transparency in directly portraying the Wa people, excluding from ambiguous interpretations. On the other hand, this intuitive documentary power can also inadvertently become an innocent accomplice to construct of unethical Orientalist stereotypes.

Out of artistic freedom, photographers manipulate images to predetermine how viewers interpret the subject; this inherently guarantees photographers with absolute authority over the conceived narrative of their subjects. When it comes to ethnic minorities like the Wa, this authority escalates into an arbitrary hegemony over the vulnerable minorities, and thereby infringe on their autonomy in defining their own identity under modern context. Through my images, I strive to construct a dispassionate rather than emotionally distorted impression of the Wa people, construing narratives from as objective a perspective as possible to document their contemporary lives. Unfortunately, in achieving this photographic aim, the fabrication of their subjectivity is unavoidable: photographers’ subjective intervention can never be extirpated; what I present necessarily remains another “stereotype” constructed through my lens.

I cannot pretentiously repudiate the limitations of imagery in objectively replicating reality, but by empathizing with their stories and creating our shared memories, I believe what I produce is not an exoticized or primitive representation of their expected customs but a depiction of their lives at present – a collective experience, both inclusive and personalized.