Private Lines under Public Gaze
a field study on Homelessness
2023
Mixed-media installation | Dimensions variable.
Photography, photographic paper, celluloid,
found objects, single-channel video, field narratives
Video: 4K, color, 04’06’’
Mandarin with Mandarin and English subtitles
這是一項由無家者參與拍攝的影像田野計畫。我將即可拍相機交予參與者，邀請他們拍下日常生活中所遇見的人與事，構成一種微型的、自我定義的存在實踐。在為期一週的參與中，共產出190張照片——其中三位參與者選擇拍攝日常中的相遇，兩對無家者伴侶則互拍彼此，透過影像表現出他們在公眾注視之下所劃出的、各自獨特的私人界線。
在展場中，這些照片被收入於每位參與者的個人物件中——如塑膠袋、背包或收納袋——構成屬於他們的私密區域。地面上依照參與者實際棲身空間所丈量的尺寸，將實拍照片輸出鋪設，觀者若欲觀看，需主動跨越這些象徵性邊界，彎身窺視，進入一段與他人距離與親密性的倫理場域。
觀看因此成為一場位置的交換：我們不再處於支配性的觀看位置，而是進入一種對「不可被完全理解」之他者的承認狀態。誰擁有觀看的權力？誰能選擇被觀看的方式？誰有權擁有自己的後台？哪些注視是被允許的，而哪些則構成掠奪？觀者的每一次窺視，都是對觀看的反身體驗，也是一種暫時讓渡控制權的實踐：我是否能在觀看的同時，不剝奪他者的主體性？
《邊界——公眾注視下的私人界線》是一項將空間作為倫理機制的裝置實驗，重新架構一個讓參與者說話得以發生的觀看場。無家狀態作為一種流動的生存技術，在此被轉化為影像、尺寸、位置與觀看的協商關係，將城市裡最常被無視的存在，重新放回觀看政治的中心。
在展場中，這些照片被收入於每位參與者的個人物件中——如塑膠袋、背包或收納袋——構成屬於他們的私密區域。地面上依照參與者實際棲身空間所丈量的尺寸，將實拍照片輸出鋪設，觀者若欲觀看，需主動跨越這些象徵性邊界，彎身窺視，進入一段與他人距離與親密性的倫理場域。
觀看因此成為一場位置的交換：我們不再處於支配性的觀看位置，而是進入一種對「不可被完全理解」之他者的承認狀態。誰擁有觀看的權力？誰能選擇被觀看的方式？誰有權擁有自己的後台？哪些注視是被允許的，而哪些則構成掠奪？觀者的每一次窺視，都是對觀看的反身體驗，也是一種暫時讓渡控制權的實踐：我是否能在觀看的同時，不剝奪他者的主體性？
《邊界——公眾注視下的私人界線》是一項將空間作為倫理機制的裝置實驗，重新架構一個讓參與者說話得以發生的觀看場。無家狀態作為一種流動的生存技術，在此被轉化為影像、尺寸、位置與觀看的協商關係，將城市裡最常被無視的存在，重新放回觀看政治的中心。
This work is a field-based photographic project created in collaboration with individuals experiencing homelessness. I distributed disposable cameras to participants and invited them to document people and moments they encountered in daily life—forming a micro-scale, self-defined practice of existence. Over the course of a week, the group collectively produced 190 photographs. Among them, three participants chose to capture everyday encounters with strangers, while two homeless couples photographed each other, expressing through images the unique private boundaries they negotiate under constant public gaze.
In the exhibition space, the photographs are stored within each participant’s personal belongings—plastic bags, backpacks, or storage sacks—forming intimate zones specific to each individual. Prints of the photos are laid out across the floor, their arrangement based on the measured dimensions of the participants’ actual sleeping or resting spaces. To view the images, visitors must cross these symbolic thresholds, bending down and leaning in—entering an ethical space of proximity and relational distance.
Here, viewing becomes a positional exchange: we are no longer in the dominant position of the observer but are drawn into a space that demands the recognition of an other who cannot be fully understood. Who holds the power to look? Who can choose how they are seen? Who has the right to claim a backstage? What kinds of gazes are permissible, and which become forms of appropriation? Each act of viewing becomes a reflexive confrontation with the act of looking itself—an exercise in the temporary relinquishment of control: Can I look without taking? Can I witness without stripping away the other’s subjectivity?
Boundaries – Private Lines under Public Gaze is an installation that treats spatial arrangement as an ethical mechanism. It does not speak for the homeless, but reconfigures the conditions under which speaking—and being seen—might become possible. Homelessness, often understood as a state of displacement, is here reframed as a mobile survival technique—translated into images, dimensions, positions, and negotiations of visibility—bringing the most overlooked bodies of the city back into the political center of seeing.
In the exhibition space, the photographs are stored within each participant’s personal belongings—plastic bags, backpacks, or storage sacks—forming intimate zones specific to each individual. Prints of the photos are laid out across the floor, their arrangement based on the measured dimensions of the participants’ actual sleeping or resting spaces. To view the images, visitors must cross these symbolic thresholds, bending down and leaning in—entering an ethical space of proximity and relational distance.
Here, viewing becomes a positional exchange: we are no longer in the dominant position of the observer but are drawn into a space that demands the recognition of an other who cannot be fully understood. Who holds the power to look? Who can choose how they are seen? Who has the right to claim a backstage? What kinds of gazes are permissible, and which become forms of appropriation? Each act of viewing becomes a reflexive confrontation with the act of looking itself—an exercise in the temporary relinquishment of control: Can I look without taking? Can I witness without stripping away the other’s subjectivity?
Boundaries – Private Lines under Public Gaze is an installation that treats spatial arrangement as an ethical mechanism. It does not speak for the homeless, but reconfigures the conditions under which speaking—and being seen—might become possible. Homelessness, often understood as a state of displacement, is here reframed as a mobile survival technique—translated into images, dimensions, positions, and negotiations of visibility—bringing the most overlooked bodies of the city back into the political center of seeing.
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