Moved.

http://jacquelinechang.blogspot.com

Golden Light

 

I like quiet moments where you can just sit and think about life, moments and the people that matter. Just a few days ago, I embarked on a ‘swim everyday for ten days leading right up till my flight to Singapore’ task (in preparation for how much I think I’ll be eating for the ten days in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur). So far I’ve managed to stick to five out of six days and I have discovered that I quite like the way my mind wanders when I’m swimming. It’s nice to have time to wonder about life like that.

To Scatter Like The Seagulls

This was taken just before sunset whilst walking across a bridge in Istanbul, hence the tinge of orange at the bottom of the photo. We were headed back to the hotel at the end of a day of a roaming and the seagulls were just roving over the city. Sometimes the feeling of familiarity is pretty liberating – to be free yet know where you belong.

Waiting And Pressing On

Hello April. Time really flies. It’s just three more weeks till I go home for a short but meaningful visit to my family in Singapore. As with most relationships in life, it’s not so much the quantity of time but quality of time spent together. I had two lovely phone conversations with my grandpa in Singapore and my grandma in China this morning and I’m really looking forward to seeing them again. They’re such beautiful people, even with their imperfections, just for who they are to me.

Apparently with the recent sad incidents in Japan, some people have been shaken to quit their lifelong jobs that they’ve taken so long to build up just so they can spend time with the people who are close to them. I think that’s a beautiful thing. Too often in life, we wait till it’s too late to do things that matter with people that matter. My advice is…don’t wait too long – relationships are meant to be treasured.

P.s. On a separate note, I recently submitted an entry to a photography open call, and if you like what you see, please hit up a few votes for me. http://www.3rdwardopencall.com/jacquelinechang

Greenwich

I spent a weekend in Greenwich. It felt so different from London. It was almost as if I had been transported to somewhere in America or Australia. We walked through side streets and alleyways around the corner. Then we spotted this car parked in between a dance school and a catering warehouse. The two sticks come out from the back of the car make it seem as though the car has magic wings that will send it flying any time.

Awake My Soul

脱离

舍不得

Frozen

Leading

Impromptu

Did a mini shoot for a friend last night.
Surprised myself with what random things I have.
One of which was this clothesline.

The weather’s gone chilly.
Been interviewing/selecting photographers to work with my company.
Being on the flip side of things is good.
Makes me see how others see me.
That plus looking at some old photos has been inspiring.
More ways to improve over and over again.

Feeling the momentum picking up.
Love being inspired, on all fronts, and especially for photography.
On another note, it’s 6.5 weeks to Christmas.
2010, where did you go? It’s been a big year indeed.

Some days I feel like this.
Repeatedly being asked if I’m sure.
Gotta keep my head above the water.
Gotta focus on the bigger picture.

A few of us got together for a homey cookout on Saturday.
I love homey hangouts.

Sometimes it feels like dreams are pretty possible.
Reminder to self (& everyone else): don’t get sucked in by the nitty-gritty that don’t matter.
Life’s a lot bigger than buggers.

A week in my grandma’s village was a plunge into something different.
It was such a luxury to have endless hours to daydream.
My favourite part of the day was walking to the neighbourhood tea house after dinner.
Sipping countless cups of Chinese tea makes me feel peaceful.
Then topping up the same tea cup with 娘酒, the local homemade Hakka wine.

茶中情與酒中情
兩個都讓我想起你 － 不同的你

In most circumstances, there is light and there is darkness.
Some people see either, I tend to notice both.
Maybe it’s something to do with me and photography.
But I guess at the end of the day, it’s about what you choose to focus on.
I’m off to KL tomorrow for a refreshing time, a time to ponder and mark out new expectations.

This is why I love cities.
The lights and the atmosphere at night.
So over the weekend, it was byebye London (temporarily) and hello Singapore.
Two weekends ago, it was byebye Russell Square, hello Barbican.
And over next weekend, it’s byebye Killiney, hello Holland.
As long as I’m still in a city, there’s still magic.

On the move, on the move. An abundance of blessings; too many to count.
Back to Singapore tomorrow for a break and I’m quite excited about it.
Will be spending some time in Kuala Lumpur and hopefully my grandmother’s village in China too.
For now, I’m really thankful for my new place in London.

Always waiting, always there.
This elderly couple was walking really slowly. Absurdly slowly.
Yet they still took immense effort to hold hands.
I really love the beauty in these everyday things that warm the heart.

Run Riot Feature

3 of the photos that I shot at the last Chocolate & Booze event are featured in a recent article by Leslie Deere on Run Riot.

Check it out here!

And while you’re at it, Leslie is a sound, sculpture, photography and moving image artist who’s working with us for the upcoming Tequila event. You should check out her site too.

All The Right Moves

Flowing Petals

Yesterday’s Brighton Amidst Beer

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Ice-Book

Shot my friend’s friend’s graduating private view event for the display of her final work from MA Book Arts at Camberwell College of Arts. Her name is Qiongjie Yu and she made this book of ice. It has 4 copies of the same letter from her ex-boyfriend embedded in the ice. With each copy, some words in the letter are removed until the very last copy is an incomprehensible letter. It shows how the ex no longer has any significance in her life, thus the letter doesn’t have any meaning to her. This concept is further strengthened by the physical state of the book itself. As the night progressed, the ice melted to water, transitioning from a piece of art to nothingness.

20100703

Sometimes it just feels a little tiring
and sad
and I just wish somehow it all wouldn’t matter at all.

20100702

The light midnight rain that brushes against the window panes
is calming
in a way that reminds me of the cold sake we drank in the little udon shop in Paris.

Perspectives

[The flower girls climbing up the stairs of the chateau.]

The beginning of the end or the end of the beginning. I finally feel released! Can’t believe I’m done with school yet again.

A Broken Part

[About two weeks ago, Philip invited me to document the process of him being involved in the making of a highlight piece of costume for the play, A Broken Part. He had made a crown, jewellery, a top, a skirt and an apron out of clay. One of the significant scenes in the play was the tearing apart of this entire outfit. It was fascinating being a part of the moment when the clay outfit slowly crumbled to nothingness.]

All moments are but fleeting.

Everything Is Hanging

[Cos shop display in Paris.]

The story of patience during seasons of transition means I have to learn to not be too excitable. Everything is in limbo: final presentation at our conference, degree shows, finding the right job, moving house in London and in Singapore, and it goes on. 人生有来有往；拿得起也就应该可以放得下。

凡 事 都 有 定 期 ， 天 下 萬 務 都 有 定 時 。生 有 時 ， 死 有 時 ； 栽 種 有 時 ， 拔 出 所 栽 種 的 也 有 時 ；殺 戮 有 時 ， 醫 治 有 時 ； 拆 毀 有 時 ， 建 造 有 時 ；哭 有 時 ， 笑 有 時 ； 哀 慟 有 時 ， 跳 舞 有 時 ；拋 擲 石 頭 有 時 ， 堆 聚 石 頭 有 時 ； 懷 抱 有 時 ， 不 懷 抱 有 時 ；尋 找 有 時 ， 失 落 有 時 ； 保 守 有 時 ， 捨 棄 有 時 ；撕 裂 有 時 ， 縫 補 有 時 ； 靜 默 有 時 ， 言 語 有 時 ；喜 愛 有 時 ， 恨 惡 有 時 ； 爭 戰 有 時 ， 和 好 有 時 。

Colour Up

[Walked past a store with this yummy refracted colour light in Paris on Sunday.]

A French Affair

[Jerome, the Singaporean-French groom, was unsuspectingly lifted up into the air by his buddies.]

I’ve just returned from Paris where I was shooting a wild wedding together with Bernard of Avenue 8. It was an amazing weekend!

Happily Sheepish

[This is my ever-smiley Hungarian classmate, Kata.]

In March this year, I had the privilege of shooting portraits of all my classmates. Can’t believe 2 academic years have gone by in a flash and it’s just one more month of mad prepping for our awesome conference, InnovationLDN. Check it out here.

Pushing On Bit By Bit

[Alex Mckechnie mixing up cocktails at the latest Chocolate & Booze event, Deliver Us From Innocence, by The Tasting Sessions.]

With the dissertation just submitted yesterday, and The Chocolate & Booze event finishing up the night with roaring success on Tuesday, I finally have time to relax a bit more. (More time for photography too.) Drinks and music tonight! I’m thankful I have so many things to be occupied with.

Acceptable In The Eighties

[Talking on the dance floor.]

Can’t wait for this time next week, when the major dissertation would have been submitted. Writing it makes me feel like I’m going through a detox.

Revisit Places Revisit Thoughts

[Strolling along the same riverwalk on my second trip to Barcelona, I saw this.]

It’s Time To Make Up Your Mind

[Me at the Museo de Arte Contemporàneo de Barcelona during one of the most difficult yet most careless periods of my life.]

With all imperfections in the photo: eye bags, sloping shoulders, fingers that are long, slightly bow-legged, weight that should have been lost…with less of me there is more of You. And we are all imperfect.

French Bridge Musicians

[Jazz trio playing in the middle of the road on a blocked-off bridge over the River Seine in Paris.]

Live a little, dream a little. Do the things they might belittle.

Last Day To Catch It

My good friend Zixi is having her first solo exhibition in Singapore and tomorrow is the last day to catch it. Don’t miss out!

天空很大却看不清楚

[Sunset in Palma.]

I’m back from a bout of holidays, fully charged up and refreshed for an intensive month of dissertation-writing that requires submission in about a month’s time. Looking forward to the upcoming bout of gigs and concerts in the next month too.

Spirited Away

[One of the last trains of the day crossing the river from Arnside to Grange-over-Sands.]

It was almost as though I had walked onto the set of Spirited Away (directed by Hayao Miyazaki) – watching the train ‘float’ over the water in near-darkness.  This was especially since I had just watched the film again during the last Jap class of the term the week before. Sometimes I daydream about living in an animated film.

Over The Earth’s Edge

[We woke up to discover that fog had descended upon the estuary at the tip of the lake district.]

Sometimes we don’t know what’s on the other side. Sometimes we do know because we’ve been there before, yet it’s actually better to pretend to have not seen and just live in the moment.

Away For A Week

[The ceiling at Congress Hall.]

Almost Like Wax

[Models on the runway at the recent One Charity Fashion Show put up by LSE Chinese Society and UAL Hong Kong Society to raise funds for the Haiti earthquake. The shirt my friend Cassey designed is featured on the female model.]

The models in the photos above look so polished, they almost appear like wax figurines to me.Watching and sort of helping out at the behind-the-scenes of a pretty successful fashion show (albeit a student-run one) was quite an eye-opener. I’ve never been in a room just swarmed with good-looking Hong Kong people before – it was almost like a TVB drama come to life. It’s nice to appreciate good make-up, good hair, good style, good faces, good bodies and be surrounded by people like that. It’s not just the models I’m talking about, it was everyone from the designers to the other photographers to the make-up artists to the runners etc.; I think 欣赏 is a more apt word and that’s the beauty of language too, Chinese just packs in so much more punch sometimes.

Then it got me thinking, when something seems so beautiful in real-life, it seems that we compare it to things that are not real-life like movies and wax figurines. Why is something too beautiful to be true not considered as true or real?

We’re Puppets On A String

[A rehearsing dancer before a show.]

Contemplating form, function and substance versus speed, flow and relationships.

Cheers To Love

[Happy love moments in the midst of Monocle's Spain Survey Launch Party at Iberica.]

I had the opportunity to shoot at the Monocle event about 2 weeks ago and it’s nice to see little snippets of quiet moments between couples and strangers in the midst of all the noise going on. Shooting was also very different from the work I usually do with them and so it was like taking a backseat for a night. Watching the people mingle was like watching a movie in a way – almost like voyeurism of connections but not quite.

Ceramic Photos

[Philip Li features my photos on his website. He is a talented ceramics artist.]

Check out Philip’s website here. And his first contributor’s article with Wallpaper will be out in the April issue: rise of ceramics.

Eye-spy

[Eye-spying the private park next to the office on a glorious sunny day.]

The London weather was almost Australian for the past few days but today it’s back to grey again.

Plus Benefits

[The blurrer the lines the better.]

Night Chance Encounters

[The black dress collection.]

Accidental Incidences

[We've been here many times in the past few days. It's a lift.]

Up In The Air

[不想擁有太多情緒｜一杯紅酒配電影]

2 Unreal Nights

[The morning after.]

怎么开口／无须言说

Bigger Than Before

[The full moon on Friday 29 January was supposed to be the biggest this year.]

So, my bag got stolen on Thursday. Well, I almost never lose my things and I’m usually in control. But this is the second time in my whole life that my bag got stolen. I had two cameras in them (same as the last time my bag got stolen). My favourite snap/film camera was in there and one of my polaroid cameras. But the more difficult thing to let go of was the entire roll of finished film that was in the bag. All the memories that are precious to me and worthless to the stealer. And my January diary. And my thermos flask that I like to bring to work/school.

It was very strange how I had mixed feelings that night. I wasn’t happy but I wasn’t sad to the extent that material things are just that and can be replaced so I was mostly calm. But I didn’t like the empty feeling of losing the memories. It jolted me into thought. Have my memories been reduced to solely photos and diaries? Have my photos and diaries become me? And then the bizarre occurrence of bumping into an old neighbour at the police station who had just got mugged. The situation was so random it was almost humorous.

The last time my bag got stolen, I had everything restored in exceedingly better quality and quantity. I can’t begin to imagine what good restorations will spring up on me this time.