I said goodbye to each room, as if saying goodbye to you

I said goodbye to each room, as if saying goodbye to you is a series of photographs that speak to life, loss and the houses we inhabit.

Created a few months after my Por Por (Chinese maternal grandmother) died, on her birthdate, I visited her house for the last time. It was a house I knew well, a migrant home in one of Melbourne’s suburbs - a constant in my family and filled with childhood memories - now emptied of all her belongings. Although she had not lived there for her final years, there was a strange sense that the house still embodied her; that the smells and remembering could envelop me, allowing me to say goodbye.

The series draws together photographs of the empty rooms, remaining objects, deteriorating house details and images of myself within the spaces. While being a personal space for me, it also speaks to the many suburban houses once proudly owned by migrants as part of their ‘Australian dream’. With this generation of migrant Australians now passing away, so too is the significance of their family house, with the inevitable reality of being demolished to create a new production of multi-complex housing. Happening across Australia, with a growing population perhaps with different values, this work contemplates the importance, and resonance of these homes within our cultural landscape.