Purpose is not easy to find, but at the age of nine, Amanda LuYm already declared hers to her family. A proud Cebuana, LuYm was among the four Cebu-based artists whose works were featured in Qube Gallery’s ‘Familiar Echoes’ show on February 8.
“I told my dad I’m going to be a designer, and then it progressed into [me] being a photographer. I was always a creative,” she said.
Lavender Haze 1 (2023) by Amanda LuYm
She is trained in fine art photography from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and finished her graduate studies at The Academy of Art University in San Francisco.
She also is the co-founder and Creative Head of Disenyo Del Sur. After years of doing commercial photography, she resumed her fine art work in 2018, which later produced the Lavender Haze series of photos.
Lavender Haze 2 (2023) by Amanda LuYm
According to LuYm, each photo can be seen as the establishing shot of a movie. They were taken ten minutes before sunset on the Shakton coast in Hokkaido, Japan.
Lavender Haze 3 (2023) by Amanda LuYm
The series title, Lavender Haze, actually comes from the 1950s term. There was a popular saying at that time that being in a lavender haze is feeling perfect love or enjoying an amazing moment that you did not want to end, like an early morning sunset.
“You’re looking at the progression of the loss of light, but the beauty in the loss is stunning,” LuYm said, about her series.
The Child (2023) by Amanda LuYm
A lover of films and pop culture, LuYm is also a fan of horror films in the 1980s, especially Steven Spielberg’s Poltergeist. This inspired her recent “digital collages and manipulation” pieces using ink and fine art paper, also featured in Qube Gallery’s ‘Familiar Echoes’ show on February 8.
“[The pieces] are conversations with one’s personal narrative. They are amalgamations of emotion and situation; and so that’s what I chose to represent them as,” she said.
She uses extensive handwritten notes to keep track of these representations, which usually become “cautionary tales” once she builds stories around them.
LuYm with her digital collages
LuYm is an artist, but is also a clothing and jewelry designer. To balance these two worlds, she reminds herself and everyone with similar interests that design is to fulfill a function while art is much more open ended.
“How I function in the fine art world and how I function in the design world are two completely different things,” she said.
LuYm found her purpose as an artist and as a designer as a child, and feels grateful to be recognized as both even well into her adult life. For her, the hard work paid off and she assures people she knew then but lost contact with that thankfully, “this little weirdo made it!”
LuYm’s work will be featured at this year’s Art Fair Philippines at the Link Ayala Center, Makati, available for viewing on February 15.
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