THOSE STUBBORN AND ROMANTIC PEOPLE
2024
The flex of a muscle. The crinkle of worn fabric. A stare into space. The shimmer off leather loafers. These are the minutia that photographer Dean Qiulin Li captures with his lens, painting a portrait not solely of people navigating spaces, but the communities that form – unconsciously – through our connections with each other every day. Every frame holds in it a relationship and a story.
This time, they’re all connected.
In his latest collection of photographic works, Li has brought together a menagerie of glimpses, each plucked from the routines of those closest to him. When siloed, these windows into the lives of friends, fellow artists, and loved ones serve as speculative entry points into individual existences, connected, it seems, only by Li and his camera. However, brought together, not only as images on walls but as alluring points of curiosity, Li’s works duplicate his own sense of community and camaraderie, inviting everyone to join his gathering of those stubborn and romantic people.
Gregory Uzelac