Photography Is the Best Language
Curators Macy Castañeda Lee and Mengwen Cao with Creative Director Liz Wood and Gallery Lead of Fugue Gallery Eric Chan.
Photography as a universal language has always fascinated me, and I have always admired how an image transports different people to different worlds. In my upbringing of having always learned and practised different languages in different parts of the world I lived, I was faced with a whole other challenge when I first owned a camera. I was able to use my mom’s old Nikon D90. I took into account all of the images that struck me growing up and what kind of world they transported me to when I started photography. I took photos of everything. Laying prints out for the first few times especially, I found typical and repetitive images when I was using this old Nikon camera, with almost similar composition, lighting, and color. I was frustrated with myself and figuring out what my eye was. I had an expectation that my visual fluency would find itself at an immediate start, considering my background of scintillating wit in language skills. Visual literacy, I found, was much harder because there aren’t many categories of perfectly constructing a paragraph of an image. There are no ellipses or ums or rules or structure to what should make an image great. And finally, to my satisfaction, I found solace in just photographing and being present in the moment. And to be patient, and open, to see how your eye evolves. And to ask people around you what they think. Every now and then there are many questions of “what do you see?” to my peers. Yet it was still a difficult circumstance for me to actually arrive somewhere for photo work. For something so simple, for an art so universally loved, I found photography at the beginning of my career to also be extremely gatekept. I wanted to teach and push myself to the extent of visual fluency, create community, and continue the world-building inspired by congenital nomadic existence.
Image during the June 12 opening of Imaginary Ceilings at 141 Canal Street.
Worlds Through Minds is a photo collective and gallery I founded with my friend Jiji Patricio back at the University of California. We met through the music scene in our school. I found a grant that the University of California was giving through my primary workspace as a student worker and applied for it. They were giving a big grant for a creative project that is able to shed light on mental health and disability rights. I applied and decided to curate a photography and performance show at the local art gallery under the UC, focusing on themes of battling mental health struggles, illness and disability, and identity and queerness. It was one of the best nights of my work as a creative and organizer, as I’ve witnessed what accessible and community-based gallery and event planning can bring to others.
When I moved to New York in mid-2022, I was able to get the ball rolling more with continuing Worlds Through Minds. It was a successful launch with the help of the school grant, and many people were eager to learn more about it, but I didn’t know what it was yet. There were still many questions as to what it could be and how it could be an actual beneficial space where people could do and have a footing somewhere.
Image during the June 12 opening of Imaginary Ceilings at 141 Canal Street.
We had our first New York event at Penumbra Foundation near the Flatiro, and it was an amazing session of talking about personal project planning with Curtis Willocks, one of my best friends who teaches at FIT and ICP, along with other photographers/activists—Raphaël Gaultier, Jasmine Garoosi, Sophie Sandberg, and Aaron Kassman.
I continued, doing events, talks, and gallery shows in photo studios, cafes, museums, co-working spaces, and parks. Worlds Through Minds started producing zines, which was a wonderful start to our production journey towards working long-term with photographers. I left New York last year in June 2024 to travel nomadically for the next few months and do art residencies in Japan and Germany. I met photographers from absolutely everywhere and had the absolute best time of my life. More questions were answered through these travels. I knew I wanted WTM to decenter the West and photography in the West by highlighting more global spaces that deserve recognition.
Image of ceiling layout of Imaginary Ceilings gallery show.
Then I figured out what it was. Worlds Through Minds is a global gallery and community that, at its core, truly tries to bind people together and believes that photography should have no borders. In our world, everything is political, including art and freedom. In WTM, there is a strong need to prioritize visual stories from people of color, queer people, and marginalized communities. We prioritize photographers who have no footing and want to start out somewhere to share their work, for them to be listened to and seen. We encourage people in our spaces to speak their native languages and ask questions relentlessly.
Our events primarily function between New York, Manila, and soon in Berlin. Our collective is based in New York, with most of our partners residing here in the city. Our open call for our partner galleries is open to global photographers. Our in-person events and talks by photographers are always free. Soon, we plan to make an online workshop series, where mid-career and professional photographers share their journeys, insights, and tips for work in their native language. Our current articles and future ones will always have a bilingual translation if not in English. We’re eager to work with more photographers in the global south. We believe in a free and just world. In essence, this is what WTM is really about.
It’s a start, and we’re excited to continue. We welcome all to our space and future spaces to come. I’m excited to see where the wind takes us. I’m grateful to all the amazing photographers who have worked with us in any capacity. And to you, thank you for being here.
