LES ÉTOILES DE DIANA

I left my native country, Malaysia, at the age of fourteen and for more than thirty years I have been travelling the world in search of my identity and origins. As a result, the question of uprootedness is central to my artistic creation. I belong to a hybrid generation where belonging to a geographical place is no longer important. This is the consequence of a hectic and nomadic life. I have become receptive to the specificities of peoples, cultures, political and economic regimes, climates, foods, languages and even more subtle things like currents of thought, hopes, despairs, fears, dreams... To become an artist is to be an archaeologist, an explorer and a psychologist. "Where am I?" and "Who am I?", two recurring questions for Man in his obsessive desire to know the origin of his existence. The people of Toulouse are among those alchemists and researchers who, since the Middle Ages, have never ceased to decipher the mystery of the sky and its constituent elements: earth, water, air and fire. From the very first day, I felt a telluric energy emanating from the pebbles and terracotta bricks of this fascinating city, which is at once rooted in the earth, but with its eyes constantly turned towards the sky. This is my very first photographic residency in France. My eighteen years of living in this country had not prepared me for an encounter with a city of such strength. My daily pilgrimage to the historic centre of Toulouse begins with a coffee in the garden of the antiques at the Musée Saint-Raymond. Surrounded by olive trees, acanthus, vines, palm trees and Mediterranean flowers, I find myself transported back to Roman times. A play of light and shadow draws its jagged imprint on my hands and my diary. I am hypnotised by the mysterious dance of the leaves cradled by the wind. I head for the crypt of the Saint-Sernin basilica, one of my favourite places. In the vaulted crypt, silence and calmness invade me as if I were immersed under water. I meditate for several minutes, a feeling of quiet strength invades my being. Some beliefs attribute to this site a powerful geobiology with a cosmotelluric chimney, an energy generator. I like to lose myself in the markets of Toulouse. They are the heartbeat of a city.

Diana Lui