Jenny Liu
Date2008
Mediumchromogenic print
DimensionsSheet: 65 × 48 inches (165.1 × 121.9 cm)
Framed: 66 1/4 × 49 5/16 × 2 1/8 inches (168.3 × 125.3 × 5.4 cm)
Portfolio/Series"Young American" series
Credit LineMuseum purchase with funds provided by the Honor Memorials Fund.
Object number2019.1.2
Copyright© Sheila Pree Bright.
The images and text contained on this page are owned by Telfair Museums or used by the Museum with permission from the owners. Unauthorized reproduction, transmission or display of these materials is prohibited with the exception of items deemed “fair use” as defined by U.S. and international copyright laws.Label TextShelia Pree Bright’s work consistently asks the question, “What does it mean to be an American in the 21st century?” A self-described photographic anthropologist, Bright began the Young Americans series as a partial answer to that question. With a bold concept, an American Flag, and a laptop, Bright set out across America to photograph a diverse group of Generation Y and Millennial citizens and capture their thoughts and feelings about their country, and what it means to be an American in the years and months before the 2008 election. The sitters expressed their perspectives in a statement and posed in their chosen stance with the American flag.
With half her face covered by the American flag, Jenny Liu expressed her conflicting emotions about America. She stated: “America is part of me, but at the same time it is foreign to me. I am a Chinese immigrant. My family came here when I was eight years old. Since coming to America, I can’t really define what I identify with. I became accustomed to the American lifestyle but a lot of the times, I feel like I don’t belong here. I am grateful to be here but sometimes I wonder what I would be like if I never came.”
Bright lives and works in Atlanta, GA and holds an MFA in photography from Georgia State University. Bright’s 2008 exhibition, Young Americans, debuted at the High Museum of Art. Her recent project, 1960Now, examines race, gender and generational divides to raise awareness of millennial perspectives on civil and human rights.
