Lavender Chang

Artist Statement:
Lavender Chang has a strong interest in conceptual and documentary photography. Lavender Chang’s artwork is a reflection of the sensitivity towards the subtle nuances surrounding her. She hopes to focus on these experiences, to create a canvas allowing further contemplation and letting the passage of time to leave behind traces of her mortality.

Her works have been exhibited in International Orange Photo Festival (China, 2010), Kuala Lumpur International Photo Awards 2011. She received Gold and Silver awards at The Crowbar Awards, and she is the winner of Noise Singapore Prize 2011. Lavender was also one of the nominees of documentary photography and photojournalism focused platform10; she is chosen to be one of the finalists of 2011 Mentorship Program by John Clang.

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A dissection of……
Being a Taiwanese and also a Singapore Permanent Resident, Lavender has a duo identity that she never really realizes.

In one occasion, she witnessed a mass protest against foreign immigrants in Singapore. For the first time she had the sense of exclusion. The people in the protest suddenly seem alien to her and her perspective of her own identity in this habitat shifted. She becomes more acutely curious of the people around her whom she has known for years. She seeks to understand them better by focusing on their memories, their stories. Each memory and its emotional or non-emotional attachment will slowly unfold during the process of dissecting and probing. Lavender seizes the opportunity to know more in-depth about the islanders who she’s proudly a part of by simply asking them a very seemingly mundane question. What’s your favorite hawker food?

Unconsciousness: Consciousness
This series is about recording the time the person disconnected from the world. Each photograph represents one night. Does he/she still exists if the camera does not record his/her presence? Light and time alter his/her existence. It is absorbed into the environment. My photographs show the effects of time and movement, uncovering the abstract that is under our reality. They show the passage of time during his/her unconscious state passing. When the environment is constant and his/her body and the light are the only movement in the image, the bed becomes a stage. The person becomes a performer. These images are a performance created overnight as time passes around the sleeping body.

http://www.lavchang.com