A photographic image is timeless. It freezes all things in it at the moment of photo-taking. But the stories viewers can tell by observing the elements in a phone are limitless; and this is when a still image starts to move in the viewer's mind through imaginative interpretation, and from one to many.

A still image also moves as it is succeeded by more other images in a sequence. How the first image results in the second image is the idea of montage. To the viewers, this one-to-the-next exercise is also the very game and process of interpretation.

My montage sequence Dream is inspired by Claude Cahun’s photo collage works, which is my starting point. Another inspiration is a new platform Dreamcore, which adopts a surrealist aesthetic using dream-related motifs, highlighting weird, unrealistic elements as opposed to familiar objects.

In addition to applying a surrealist principle in combining familiar images, I also identify one constant, connective, element that creates a sense of continuity through the whole work, which is an eyeball. Surrealistically, I have left open the possible meanings of each image episode. The idea of moving through a sequence of images as a process of realization is inspired by Duane Michals’ Real Dream. For example, the 3rd photo is just a part of the 4th photo, while the 5th photo is just a part of the 6th photo, so on and so forth, and I have turned this into a “guessing game” for my viewers, so they become more and more engrossed in the question, “What’s going to be in the next image?” 

As for the soundscape, I recorded the radio tuning sound effect and used it in the middle part of the photo sequence. I want to create the effect that the images are being manipulated by someone, like someone tuning the radio channels, and the dream I show is constructed by me. It is my wish that my sequence would invite viewers to the unknown, something beyond rationality.