Now(here), Just Here
Now(here), Just Here is a body of work that includes a short film, distorted photographic prints, and found pallets as sculptures. Triangulating intercountry adoption between the United States and China from narrative, abstract, and systemic perspectives, I approach adoption from different angles as one of thousands of people adopted from China into the United States.
Now(here), Just Here bends fact into fiction, representing the gaps within my history. Untitled (Caretakers) and Untitled (Babies) are metaphors: the harder you try to remember someone, the further the memory remains, paralleling my inability to recall memories. Always Already reveals adoption itineraries, shipping logs, and ‘it’ and ‘im’ on industrial shipping pallets to confront power imbalances in intercountry adoption between sending and receiving countries and the treatment of children as both subjects and objects. I can see the moon, and sometimes I wonder is a meditative reflection exploring the space between what happened and what could have been.
By juxtaposing an intimate film, large abstract prints, and found pallet sculptures, I establish a new relationship between personal, historical, and systemic facets of intercountry adoption. Key historical framing underlies the work, showcasing inseparable stories of economic policy, demographic engineering, and geopolitical power alongside adoption practices.
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