We’re actually working on the fourth one right now, with the third released in the beginning of last year! My identity, as for most people, is a work in progress since childhood. I think the motivation started there, just from physically being Asian and experiencing life from that viewpoint. I always felt like I wanted to understand more about the various cultures within Asia, which are so vast and diverse and make up 60% of the population and yet there is a very limited availability of lived and learned experiences depicted in Western and sometimes even parts of Eastern media. Reaching adulthood, I developed a career in advertising and media and it became even more apparent to me that there’s a huge gap and opportunity for Asian voices to be able to freely express themselves and be heard, without stereotypes, limitations or presumptions placed upon them.

I have an ongoing list in one of my many notebooks of potential themes. They’re meant to be a little vague and open to interpretation. The best ones are less commonly used as themes for books and magazines, and are also broad enough that the artist can decipher it as they like–for instance, taste could be seen as aesthetic, food, or even as the opposite: distaste. I like that these themes can produce more questions than give answers, in some way, too. It’s up to the artist to interpret and translate into their work.

I feel like a lot of what we see on Asian creativity and art is often pigeonholed and over-categorized, whereas I believe that cultures and disciplines are interconnected and each aspect of life influences the other. A family recipe tells so much more than how to make a tasty dish, just like a poem speaks not only about the individual writer but their environment as well. When you can see it all in one place, in one book, there’s a fluid cohesion that I think tells a bigger, more open-ended story about the people involved in its making.

I think part of this is learning about people outside of our lived experience and seeing them at a more human level. I do think to a certain extent, when we consume their media, especially a wide range of it (books, films, poems, art, etc.) we can get closer to the similarities we have as humans, and be able to empathise more with their reality. Also being conscious of how we impose ideas of a person or a culture vs. witnessing what they choose to express, create and share with us. Having more of an open discourse is definitely a way to start.

Definitely. I grew up without a very defined connection to my actual heritage, but spent a lot of my childhood in varied Asian diasporic communities. I grew up going to predominantly Indian and Filipino meditation and Korean Daoist gatherings every Sunday up unto adulthood. The diversity of the New York public school system also seamlessly involved me in lifestyles or cultural and social class upbringings outside of my own. Another experience that really affected me was studying abroad in Okinawa in high school. It opened my eyes to a world outside of just New York, and dynamics that felt totally different but welcome and familiar to my own desire for human connection.

I pulled the “inherent dominative mode” from Edward Said’s Orientalism. In it, he speaks about how we are all, specifically in the West but it can also be applied to the East, are raised to believe certain cultures or ways of being are the right or best way to be. In a lot of institutions and in the past, the dominant culture imposes their beliefs on the ones they believe to be the other, or lesser-than. They “learn” about the other culture without listening to them or allowing them to dictate their own story. With every interaction I have, book I read, or film I watch, I question my assumptions going into it and my reactions during and after that experience. I try to catch myself from making assumptions or imposing my own ideas onto the person or work. Same for creating something like this book series. I feel the more I question and challenge my initial ideas, thoughts or desires for it, the more I can catch myself falling back on generalisations.

I’d love to see Asian artists and people involved in Asian-related content put out by the West. I don’t think it’s ok anymore for a magazine to be about Japan, for instance and feature mostly European photographers, writers and models in a Japanese setting. I’d love to see Asian artists and creatives also involved in non-Asian-related content. We don’t need to only speak about our identity, just like Europeans don’t only talk about being European. Same goes for other minorities. I think the popularity of Squid Game, more Asian directors gaining notoriety and so on shows that there’s a demand for this, and that we’re capable of so many things. I’d also love for museums to categorise their work differently. Things like that.

I think the insider-outsider feeling will always stay, just like it must for diasporic individuals or people who just think a little differently from the mainstream. Simultaneous to working on Far–Near, I’ve been working on connecting more to my family in Taiwan, which helps me feel a little more familiar. I also think speaking and learning from artists I work with for the book helps me realise there are like-minded individuals across really any culture and I feel at home with those people.

I started out as a graphic designer and feel like I’ve made a few turns on my path, though I never really knew where I was going exactly anyway. Sometimes these things go in loops. I think my childhood dream to make book covers and I’ve always been an avid reader, so in some ways I’m living that dream even though I didn’t directly go after it. As far as Far–Near goes, I initially started it as a more submission-based free-for-all but have found it turning into a hybrid of submitted and commissioned work. I’m also considering expanding it further to incorporate North African artists as I feel as though there are overlap in this area of the world as well. The mission stays the same but the question of borders could be expanded.

Hearing people I’ve just met describe to me how they view the books or just realising that I’ve been able to create a platform I was looking for when I was younger is really rewarding.

I love independent filmmaking of today and from the older generations, I feel like they’re spaces where you can really see someone’s point of view. I’m super excited to see how young Chinese artists are responding to the changes in physical and political scenery in their country and abroad. I’m also very inspired to see how much more openly expressive Asian individuals inside and outside of Asia are being, how they’re incorporating inspiration from past artists and creatives, and that there’s some real demand for it. Whether the corporations and institutions like it or not, it’s at a point where we cannot be controlled anymore.

If I had more time, resources and energy I’d love to eventually expand this to spaces specifically for younger generations and kids so they can grow up feeling seen and understood and that there are a whole lot of others out there just like them. If anyone’s interested in doing that feel free to hit me up!