In 2016, facing challenges in their relationship, partners Liu Ke and Huang Huang turned to the medium that brought them together more than a decade earlier: photography. The couple took a photo of each other every day for two years, with the pairs of images eventually becoming the book “Mirror.” They tell writer Marigold Warner how the project helped them find intimacy, understand one another in a new light and rediscover the love they shared for one another.
At the tail end of 2016, after over a decade of partnership as lovers and artists, Liu Ke and Huang Huang found themselves in a romantic rut. “We were busy raising a child and dealing with everyday life,” says Huang Huang, speaking via video call; her husband nods beside her. “We felt like we were breaking apart.”
Some couples might consider counseling; others some time apart—but for this Chinese duo, it was a crisis best-solved by the medium that brought them together: photography. Back in 2003, Huang Huang stumbled across Liu Ke’s photographs while browsing an online photo-sharing blog. She was a dancer, looking for a new medium of expression. She realized he was also based in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan where they were both born and raised. She reached out to ask if he would tutor her, and over several sessions of photographic excursions around the city and its surrounding natural landscapes, their romance blossomed.
Fast forward 13 years, and that love was crumbling. “We realized it was a dangerous situation for the relationship,” they say. Before the new year arrived, they made a promise: “To photograph each other every day, to rediscover the relationship, and to try and see each other in the same light as when we first met in 2003—neutrally and without judgement.”
So began “Mirror,” a two-year photographic ritual that culminated in a book and accompanying exhibition, currently on display at Tokyo’s Zen Foto Gallery. The pair had no rules or boundaries; the process was mainly dictated by their day-to-day lives. “If we felt we didn’t want to talk to each other one day, we would still take a picture, but in a very subtle way,” they explain. At the end of each day, they printed their photographs and stuck them together, marking the seam with the date.
What happens when you are forced to face your partner, to record them through a viewfinder repeatedly for 730 days? “We discovered a different concept of time, relationships and emotions. We used to think that it was all a straight line that continues and accumulates, but it’s not,” they say. Feelings fluctuate; emotions are chaotic. Desire, jealousy, compassion and trust—all the driving emotions of love are, in their very essence, unpredictable. “Every day is different,” they say. “It’s better not to get stuck to past experiences, and face the person with a fresh mind every day.”
After two years and 1,460 photographs, they stopped. “Our mindset had already shifted,” they reflect. Left with a vast diary of portraits, they started to form a sequence. The result is a breathless universe of light and shadow that chronicles their return to intimacy. It presents 164 image combinations, but also a fold-out poster of all 730 to show the full process. This is all bound in a reflective silver cover to echo its title, because since the beginning, the duo always referred to themselves as each other’s mirror. “There are things we don’t know about ourselves, but through each other, we can see ourselves more clearly,” they say. “In a mirror, you don’t always see what you want. Good or bad, it gives you a clear image of yourself.”
Some images are dynamic and playful, full of gestures and movement. Others are delicate and obscure, like a secret whispered between lovers. In many photos, it is hard to distinguish between the couple. Both have long black hair, and their faces and body parts are often disguised. This was intentional. They weren’t concerned about making a record of their daily life, the focus was to employ abstraction and performance to express “how reality is not always what you see.”
There are things we don’t know about ourselves, but through each other, we can see ourselves more clearly.
Reflecting on almost two decades of working together, for Liu Ke and Huang Huang, maintaining a healthy working partnership is all about conflict. “It's like a ball of energy. Sometimes explosions happen, and new possibilities emerge from that,” they say. “We have a lot of arguments, and that’s good because it helps us see from a different perspective. One of us has an idea, and the other can give a different way of seeing. It’s because of these discussions and arguments that we’re constantly improving.”
How they see—through the camera and their own eyes—might always be different, but what matters is that they’re looking together. This photographic ritual rekindled a dormant love, helped them find intimacy, and return to that psychic space in which they first connected. “We will never give up on each other, and we will never give up on creating,” says Huang Huang; Liu Ke smiles, and nods in agreement.