Hot Shots : Yijun (Pixy) Liao
Artist Statement
Stills from Unseen Films: This project is a tribute to all the great films I haven’t seen. I’m very interested in the film stills from those unseen films. The orphaned film stills always trigger my imagination, and become a perfect film in my mind. In this project, I setup scenes that I would like to see in a film. I pretend that these photos are from real films with various names. Most of these photos depict individuals in certain environments. They all seem to be lost in thought. What are they thinking about? In fact, they are thinking about whatever I asked them to think about. They could be thinking about whatever you think they are thinking about. These photos are from films that exist only in my mind. Now they become films that exist in your mind. In this way, the imagined film is transferred from my mind to your mind but with a meaning of its own.
Biography
Yijun (Pixy) Liao was born in Shanghai in 1979. She graduated from Shanghai International Studies University in 2002. After graduation, she worked as a freelance graphic designer for three years before moving to the United States to study photography. She received her MFA from the University of Memphis in 2008. Her first solo show was at Adam Shaw Studio in Memphis. She has participated in several group shows, both in the US and in China, including: 2008 China Lianzhou International Photography Fest, 2008 China Pingyao International Photography Fest, the Latana Project's Class of 2006 and 2007 group exhibitions. Her work was also shown in the 2007 and 2008 Annual Juried Student Exhibition at the University of Memphis and in the This and That exhibition at the University of Louisiana at Monroe. She was a Hot Shot in the 2008 second edition and won honorable mentions in the 2008 PDNedu Student Photography Contest and 28th Annual Spring Photography Contest. Her work has also been featured in the Chinese publications of Computer Arts and After 17 web magazine.