Zhilin Xiang is a visual artist working with photography and expanded lens-based practices. Their work explores the context of diaspora and impermanence through domestic interiors as sites of memory and intimacy. Shaped by experiences across different cities, Xiang reflects on how identities are formed through temporary environments.
Your Room (2025)
Your Room examines domestic space as a place of transition, where the presence of those who live there manifests through absence. The project focuses on traces left behind – objects suspended between use and abandonment – rather than depicting inhabitants directly. In these moments, the room becomes a space where memory, intimacy, and loss coexist. The project approaches the interior as an active participant in lived experience, operating as a surrogate for the body, shaped by routine, emotion, and relationships. While each space is specific, the accumulation of images forms a collective portrait reflecting broader conditions of mobility, precarity, and displacement. Through this, the project explores how photography can sustain connection and continuity when physical spaces are temporary, positioning the act of photographing as both documentation and a gesture of care.