Courage
Courage is a personal project. I made it while learning to embrace my identity as an artist and cultivating the strengths to be open while not feeling vulnerable as a Chinese and an immigrant in year 2020. I tried to build a sense of conflict and precarity with the clashing impressions of traditional sculptures being made from wood, metal, or marble, which appear solid, imposing, and substantial, with paper--a material that is fragile, delicate, accessible, even somewhat juvenile.
Though by first reading Courage might suggest a story of a bird being saved, in my mind the bird, the cage, the growing stems and flowers altogether constitute one entity—which is in fact you and me, making this a story of self-redemption. In this way, the process of creating Courage allowed me to reinforce the belief that true liberation comes from within. To seek freedom, one must first summon the courage of wanting to be free and being ready to face not only the beauty but also the challenges of a big and complicated world. And that is also why I intentionally designed the last frame to look slightly overwhelming, even chaotic.
With this, I want to spread some encouragement to people who still hesitate to voice out and choose to stay in the cage for fear of getting lost and hurt.
❤️
Come to my Life,
little sloth.
Wearing your propeller cap
you are ready to Dance.
I welcome you, await you, adore you,
such words I promise you.
Come to my Mind,
little sloth
like how, when the sun shines through trees,
the shadow Naturally join beneath.
Details
A Trilogy of Birth and Vitality
