Jayden Tran

Of course, I did not fully understand the work until I had read the biography of Fukase himself. In that, I understood what the series meant. Or at least, what it meant to me.

From Mot Minh, 2025, 13” x 19” Series

When I was in Hong Kong with my family for vacation, I was generally pretty directionless when I was taking these photos. For the most part, I just had the idea of challenging myself by taking photos in black and white to improve my compositional techniques.

One day, me and my little sister decided to visit a little camera store in Hong Kong which also sold photo books. I saw a copy of Ravens by Masahisa Fukase and recognized it immediately. I decided to purchase it and went through it about 3-4 times.

What stood out to me was the power of a photographic series. In particular, Ravens had derived its storytelling power in series rather than strong individual photos.

I looked through my photos and saw that despite being aimless with my approach initially, I was able to put together a meaningful series of 10 photos with cohesion and story.

To me, this was a very contemplative work and reflected how I felt in the last month. I felt like I was wandering on my own. In this series, I titled it “mot minh”, which translates to “alone” or literally to “one self” in Vietnamese.

Unlike Fukase who was tormented by his literal solitude, I found solace in being a wandering observer. It was not a necessarily happy moment in my life, but creating this series helped me express myself in ways I could not put into words.

I won’t delve any deeper into what I intended these images to feel like or what they mean. That’s for you to decide. I’ve chosen these four images for you to view and I hope in some ways, you would be able to feel how I felt through my photos.