As the moon-brilliance westward makes its crossing, so cherry-blossom shadows eastward

It is springtime. Like every year, as nature is spreading out, I admire the vital force that emerges from the ground. I can feel and understand my link to the cycle of life. Imperiously, this vital breath leads me and imposes its mystery.

But this time, the magic does not operate as usual. As I observe the garden, it seems to elude me, shunning any definition, its contours dissolving as I try to grasp its direction, its order. I fully recognize – I recall – the vegetal essences, even though I feel I am in a remote, unfamiliar place. I am confronted with another way of representing nature’s expanse, but I am not certain to what extent.

I discover a new kind of springtime, a beguiling inspiration. I have arrived in China.

To express this vision, I drew on the organic shapes of jade stones, on jewels and fans that bring Asia to mind. They allow for both a break and continuity between what is familiar to me and what is enigmatic, between the defined and the undefined. Through their glowing contours they allow me to show life’s emergence.

These photographs encapsulate this mystery, the oscillation and the swaying back and forth between two cultures. A momentary suspension of borders. to and fro between here and elsewhere, connection to the vital principle, they tell of this journey.

Title inspired by a Yosa Buson poem :

月光西にわたれば花影東に歩むかな

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May 2016