Steven He

The exhibition is themed around a central metaphor of the mayfly. Harusari, the Korean word for mayfly which also translates literally to “one day living thing” This work stems from the my childhood memories of growing up in a waterfront village in China. I recall collecting mayfly larvae from a stream and hiding them in a jar inside of a sock drawer. They one day transformed into adults and to my surprise flew away as I opened the drawer. I see the mayfly as a dialectical synthesis of both the past and present. The life of a mayfly; who spends virtually all of its life underwater only to emerge briefly as a “one day living thing;” resonates with my own experience moving to the UK at the age of seven. I don't see myself being either British or Chinese, I find comfort at the intersection of where these discordant experiences collide and mingle. 

I do not want to sentimentally romanticise the past or simply mourn its loss. Instead, I am interested in how progress and creation are shaped by what is fading as much as by what is remembered. Throughout my time at the house, I kept a drawer filled with small, random objects I had found while living there. Some of these objects are now embedded within the hedge in this work. I think of memories and stories much like objects: they come into contact, leave traces on one another, and are changed through their accumulation.