The Darkroom Project

Playing with the classical process of darkroom printing through the use of found natural organic elements, Singaporean photographer Hui Hsien Ng looks to explore – on a spiritual level – her current state of being.

Myth is a series of unique photographic prints, made using found organic matter and improvisational darkroom techniques. It explores inter-connectivity and is a meditation on the mysterious processes and phenomena that have formed the foundations of life and the very fabric of our existence. In a way, it is also a personal search for a sense of belonging.

At the heart of my practice is an attempt to establish some resonance between the external and internal worlds. My recent experience of living in a new, unfamiliar country led to a fascination with the shifts this place undergoes as seasons change, prompting me to collect organic matter during my walks in parks, woods, and nature reserves. Curious about their characteristics and reflecting on the cycle and origins of life, I brought them into the darkroom in order to construct an imaginary world.

Alone in the dark, making these works which allude to cosmological events and geological forces that are greater than our individual lives, it can sometimes feel as if the self is going through annihilation of sorts. Concepts attached to my own identity are stripped away, along with their corresponding obligations. However, as the self undergoes such a dissolution, it can also oddly feel like coming home.

Words and Pictures by Hui Hsien Ng.

Ng Hui Hsien is an artist, writer and researcher. Her art practice uses photography as a medium to explore themes such as consciousness, the nature of reality, (im)materiality and interconnectivity; sites where the unconscious can find expression, indirectly or otherwise. Find her on PHmuseum and Instagram.

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This feature is part of Story of the Week, a selection of relevant projects from our community handpicked by the PHmuseum curators.