I TOLD YOU, I LOVE YOU

“I told you, I love you” combines my imagination of the octet rule with the wet plate process to explore the relationship between the visible and the invisible, the fixed and the fluid, the measurable and the felt.

This project begins with my fascination with the atom, the smallest unit that builds our universe. Each atom, in its dance between attraction and repulsion, mirrors the dynamic flow of human relationships. The octet rule, the tendency of atoms to gain, lose, or share electrons in search of stability, becomes a poetic framework through which I reflect on emotional exchange. People, like atoms, move toward and away from one another. Our desires, fears, and needs are like electrons: circling, colliding, shared, withdrawn. There is no final state, only becoming.

In my practice, I express this fluidity through the wet plate process. By applying electric currents to silver nitrate-coated plates, I do not just fix an image; I release a field of unpredictable forces. The electricity scars, distorts, or reconfigures the surface, much like emotions leave their marks on the psyche. These images are not representations; they are traces of movement, inscribed through time.

Alchemy, once a bridge between matter and spirit, reminds us that transformation is not only chemical but also existential. As Carl Jung observed, the alchemical process symbolized psychic individuation, the merging and refining of the self. In making these images, I experience a similar ritual, engaging not only with materials but with the invisible forces within. The wet plate becomes both a laboratory and a mirror.

Modern science, for all its precision, still struggles to explain why matter behaves as it does. We know how to split the atom, but not fully why it binds. The octet rule, like many scientific principles, is based on observation, yet it cannot explain the deeper longing for connection. Just as atoms seek stability, so do we, not through calculation but through movement, intuition, and change.

For me, each atom is a microcosm, a vibration, a spiritual unit, and so are we. We do not fully know what happens within the atom, just as we do not fully know what lies at the center of the self. Yet we respond, we collide, we change. In the space between attraction and resistance, I search for traces of connection, meaning, and transformation. Through electricity, silver, and time, I give form to the invisible — the fleeting emotional currents that move through us, unmeasurable but deeply felt.

© 2016 Ting-wei Chang 張廷瑋

SHARON HO

I'll Go Sharpen My Pencil