LIANG YUE

Liang Yue’s photographic work negotiates the complex symbolic terrain between the exterior and interior, memory and reality and the public and the private. Her open-ended series of photos Several Dusks (2003) and Lily’s Afternoon (2003) focus on moments drawn from ordinary life. Yet, a sense of foreboding pervades all of them. Liang Yue observes and elaborates on a uniquely ambiguous, uneasy assortment of public spaces in Shanghai, but with a detached viewpoint. The images are shot just before nightfall and are linked to an elusive time and the question of presence. The snapshot aesthetic makes it difficult to think of it as specific to a single place. The recurring images are a partial and instant view of the city. Her scenes of distant frenzy co-mingle possibility and problem, and leave the viewer uncertain about their specific mood and theme. The contrast between familiarity and strangeness is highlighted, and it is precisely this feeling of contradiction that makes her photos so fascinating and attractive.