Alchemy of the Unknowns

Collaboration with James David Tabor

“Formless form, image of the unimaginable; call it certain uncertainty.” –Laozi, Dao De Jing

What would pictures look like when two strangers from Boston and Phoenix, separated by 2,700 miles, collaborate and double-expose one roll of film?

We are Lisa Tang Liu (MA) and James David Tabor (AZ), two photographers who connected on Instagram over our return to the film medium, Holga cameras, and conversations about Daoism.

In the spring of 2023, we began our conceptual project in ”film swaps,” the practice of having one photographer first expose images on an entire roll of film and mail it to another, who would then expose the same film again from the beginning. Massachusetts and Arizona are very different places. We wanted to see how images from such different places would look together. Each of us had no (or very little) knowledge of what the other person had photographed. The end results here are all surprises.

Challenged with the uncertainties of using film and the discomfort of relinquishing control over the fate of our own individual creations, we learn to accept, and even embrace, the unknowns.

Photo book available here.

Project Instagram page.