About this piece

In 2018, I stopped in Beijing's Olympic Park, where Zeng Chenggang's Torch Relay rises from the square. A line of women cast in strength with forward motion — shoulders set, bodies leaning, every figure carrying force. That soft determination is what I carried into this piece.

I pulled layers of acrylic paint and botanical impressions with a gel plate to form the background. Then I transferred my photograph by hand, lifted imperfectly, pressed into place. The process blurs edges, softens detail, and leaves behind the ghost of the original image fused with the grit of the paint.