Looking Left, Looking Right: 2014 Graduation Exhibition at Sichuan Fine Arts Institute

In 2014, I worked with senior students from the Integrated Art Program at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute as they prepared their graduation projects. The process was not easy. Each student faced pressure to create something visually appealing while dealing with both internal and external struggles—between form and formlessness, consciousness and instinct, what is visible and what is hidden, material and spirit.

It was a personal journey about what it means for something to be “beautiful.” The students had to explore not only how to act or make something, but also how to feel that action—how to choose clothing and feel it, how to look and feel that looking. They asked: how do we hang or place an object? How do we show or hide something? How do we stay, interact, or respond?

In this process, they tried to let go of fixed roles and be honest in their actions. Their imagination went beyond internal doubts to bring these works into being. Still, they might not have known if part of them was still holding back or hiding something.

We called the exhibition Looking Left, Looking Right—not out of hesitation, but as a way of searching through different perspectives. The show took place at the university’s Art Education Department gallery. I hope the energy of that moment still lives in these images, and that others can share in the spirit of exploration and bravery.