Mind(e)scape

Hong Kong, 2021 - 2022


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Throughout 2021, I went on multiple journeys with dancers and yogis to the outskirts of the city, the playground of nature that is always open.

The photos you see were born in the liminal space between night and day, between sleep and wakefulness, between hurting and healing. They’re broken pieces of ourselves that we uncovered in the fissures, faultlines and crevices. They’re the evidence that we steeled ourselves for the frightful chills and shadows of our pasts; that we somehow found our footing in rising waters and on shifting ground; that we sought out the brightest light in the darkest corners.

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Raised as a city dweller, I had never been an outdoor person until I started photographing yogi friends in nature in 2020. It was only then that I started seeing in earnest the parallels between the human body and the landscape. The curves of my friends' profiles and the mountain ridges in the background, with yoga poses inspired by nature: eagle arms, downward facing dog, mountain pose…

Nature has a way of asserting itself, as the best set designer, the backdrop and as the centerpiece all at the same time. Unlike the city, rules are not given and space is plenty.

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Photographing yoga asanas is often about capturing the best version of a particular pose. Wondering what it'd mean to capture a series of movements, I found myself photographing dancers in 2021.

I wasn’t doing videos of dances, which I imagine would be like transcribing a complete sentence. With photography, the questions become —

How do I pick a moment that represents the spirit of a series of movements?
If I only choose one shot out of a series of ten moves, am I selecting just one phrase out of a sentence? Or perhaps photographs of dance would always be closer to a poem, a half-remembered dream?

One of the lovely things about being a human is that you are called in each moment to bring yourself to birth. A human is a continual, unfolding event. Because we live in these physical bodies which remain largely the same throughout the course of our life, we forget we are emerging theatres of undiscovered territories all the time. A life that is awakened to beauty, part of what it means is this constant disclosure and this energy and vitality of continuing to live in a new place within. As the outer light unveils the magic of landscape, and light is the priestess of landscape, the inner light of the soul awakens the undiscovered territories that are there. We are earthen vessels that hold immense treasures.


As the earth is endless and vast and deep, so too is the human heart. Sometimes part of the magic of perception is a tiny little chink can give you a glimpse of a vast landscape that you never gazed at at all. This is part of the beauty of friendship and love – the beloved introduces you to yourself that you could have never found yourself. That’s one of the lovely gifts of a really good friendship. Your friend becomes a midwife to your own emerging landscape of soul.




– John O’Donohue

Mind(e)scape

Hong Kong, 2021 - 2022


.

​

Throughout 2021, I went on multiple journeys with dancers and yogis to the outskirts of the city, the playground of nature that is always open.

The photos you see were born in the liminal space between night and day, between sleep and wakefulness, between hurting and healing. They’re broken pieces of ourselves that we uncovered in the fissures, faultlines and crevices. They’re the evidence that we steeled ourselves for the frightful chills and shadows of our pasts; that we somehow found our footing in rising waters and on shifting ground; that we sought out the brightest light in the darkest corners.

.

Raised as a city dweller, I had never been an outdoor person until I started photographing yogi friends in nature in 2020. It was only then that I started seeing in earnest the parallels between the human body and the landscape. The curves of my friends' profiles and the mountain ridges in the background, with yoga poses inspired by nature: eagle arms, downward facing dog, mountain pose…

Nature has a way of asserting itself, as the best set designer, the backdrop and as the centerpiece all at the same time. Unlike the city, rules are not given and space is plenty.

.

Photographing yoga asanas is often about capturing the best version of a particular pose. Wondering what it'd mean to capture a series of movements, I found myself photographing dancers in 2021.

I wasn’t doing videos of dances, which I imagine would be like transcribing a complete sentence. With photography, the questions become —

How do I pick a moment that represents the spirit of a series of movements?
If I only choose one shot out of a series of ten moves, am I selecting just one phrase out of a sentence? Or perhaps photographs of dance would always be closer to a poem, a half-remembered dream?

One of the lovely things about being a human is that you are called in each moment to bring yourself to birth. A human is a continual, unfolding event. Because we live in these physical bodies which remain largely the same throughout the course of our life, we forget we are emerging theatres of undiscovered territories all the time. A life that is awakened to beauty, part of what it means is this constant disclosure and this energy and vitality of continuing to live in a new place within. As the outer light unveils the magic of landscape, and light is the priestess of landscape, the inner light of the soul awakens the undiscovered territories that are there. We are earthen vessels that hold immense treasures.


As the earth is endless and vast and deep, so too is the human heart. Sometimes part of the magic of perception is a tiny little chink can give you a glimpse of a vast landscape that you never gazed at at all. This is part of the beauty of friendship and love – the beloved introduces you to yourself that you could have never found yourself. That’s one of the lovely gifts of a really good friendship. Your friend becomes a midwife to your own emerging landscape of soul.




– John O’Donohue

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