Teeth, Petrichor, Harvest
My grandparents passed away before I could even remember, and I have never indeed seen them in my memory. Whenever my parents would talk about their stories when I was a child, there was always a strange sense of distance, as if I were listening to stories about strangers. During my childhood, I often imagined how different life would be if they were still around, what they would have been like if they were still here. By chance, I accompanied my father to the small town where my grandparents came from. Through exploring my grandparents' homeland, I began to imagine their images and their non-existent elderly lives. I started to search for traces of my grandparents in unfamiliar elderly people and tried to experience some warmth and transcendent connection in my interactions with them. This is the perspective and starting point of the project 'teeth, petrichor, harvest'. While creating the project I came up with many fresh discoveries and impressions, which will be developed as a long-term project in different chapters.
*Petrichor is the earthy, pleasant smell that often accompanies the first rain after a long period of warm and dry weather. It is caused by a combination of volatile compounds that are released from the soil and plants during rainfall. The word "petrichor" is derived from the Greek words πέτρα(petra), meaning stone and ἰχώρ(īchōr) meaning the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology.
我的祖父母都在我开始记事前相继过世,我记忆中从未真实地见过他们。小时候每次听父母谈起他们的故事总会有一种奇异的距离感,好像在听陌生人的故事。在童年时期,我时常会想象生活中如果有他们的参与会有何不同,如果他们尚在人世会又会是什么样子。一次偶然的机会,我跟随父亲来到了祖父母故乡的小镇。通过对祖父母故土的探索,我对他们的形象和他们不存在的老年生活展开了想象。我开始在陌生的老人身上寻觅我祖父母的影子,并试图在跟他们的交流中体味一些温情的,超越时空的交汇,这是这个项目的视角和起点。在创作teeth, petrichor, harvest这个项目的过程中,我有了许多新的发现和感受,将以不同篇章的形式作为一个长期项目 进行发展。
*Petrichor是指雨水落在干燥土壤上时产生的气味。其英文字来自希腊文πέτρα(petra, 岩石rock), 或πέτρος(petros, 石头stone), 以及ἰχώρ(īchōr, 希腊神话中在神的 体内所流的血液)。