Family Album by Ramona Jingru Wang

Issue 164

In American popular culture, the Asian subject has long been stereotyped as many contradictory things: forever foreign, inscrutable, exotically beautiful, and dangerous. Ramona Jingru Wang’s Family Album is a quiet refusal of such representations, instead creating images of Asian diasporic people that defy easy categorization.

As an artist and model, Ramona has deeply considered the role that photography plays in exploiting Asian models and creating flat narratives. The Family Album, printed on newsprint, challenges what we think or see by blurring the boundaries between private family snapshots and commercial fashion photography. The photographs show intimate scenes at home between Asian people who may be family members, lovers, or friends, but could also be strangers. The project asks: are these family photos any less authentic if the subjects are professional models, or if the photographer is visible in the frame? For Ramona, the act of making photographs itself can become an act of familial care by creating intimacy and shifting perceptions.

Ramona Jingru Wang (she/her/hers) lives and works in New York, NY.
ramonajingruwang.com | @ramonadai

All images ©Ramona Jingru Wang