A Lost Train of Thoughts & A Series of Prints
Kunming City, Yunnan Prov. China 650206
In the summer of 2021, I went back home. Although the mainland China mailing system had long stopped using postcodes, I include mine in every document as the number looks similar to my Chicago ZIP code. While I was in Chicago, I came from Yunnan. But once I came back to Yunnan, I was from Chicago. Part of me had also belonged to Burma, yet I was living in an opposite reality from Diana. 2022 was the strictest year of pandemic control in China. To enter any shared space, a negative Covid test result was required every two days. While I spent an hour or two in the queue for nucleic acid tests every other day, Diana——two-hour flights away in Yangon——was taking care of her sick families, and many of her friends went into the jungle to join revolution forces. I, too, belong to the revolution, because I grew up wearing a “red scarf”——all children in new China are socialist pioneers——for our revolution had won. And as inheritors of victory, we need to remember that red symbolizes blood. Now that part of me belongs to Burma, I witness the blood behind victory, and there is no pride but only sorry.
Spring 2022
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
Drawers—Oh Train 2022
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
Those Nights I talk to you about Chagall 2022
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
Your Pride 2022
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
The Moon is on the Moon 2022
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
etching, wood frame
16.8*22cm
One More Station 2022
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
etching, wood frame
22.5*31.5cm
A Lost Train of Thoughts & A Series of Prints (Letters from Yangon) is a collective project of Diana and I, published by LEAP Magazine. The project consists of one monologue from Diana, six prints from me, and two letters between us. It serves as a personal response to the political crisis in Myanmar in 2021.