August 29, 2016

Meet Burbank Photographer: Li Sun

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Li Sun.

Li, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I was born into an engineering family. My parents both worked in a research institute located in the countryside of Beijing, and I always thought I would follow in their footsteps. Unfortunately though, I was never very good at mathematics, and in the end I chose to study advertising at university. To be honest, I did not particularly like advertising once I began to study it in greater depth (though to this day I still enjoy the design aesthetics aspect). This is mostly because advertising is a way of speaking from the perspective of others, and not from my own heart. After two years of advertising work experience in Beijing, I began to rethink my future career. It was at this time that photography came into my mind. I believe that photography is a form of expression that can show my own thoughts and ideas, and in a manner of speaking, I already had a longstanding connection with photography. One of my father’s hobbies was collecting mechanical cameras – his favorite was a Leica M3. In my childhood, he taught me all about light meters, focusing on subjects and the golden section method, all using that camera. When I decided to go abroad to obtain a master’s degree in photography, he gave me his M3 as a present.

I came to Los Angeles in September 2013, the first stop on my journey. The MFA course was tight and busy. During those 18 months, I trained myself in both technical and aesthetic aspects, and I also made many friends from Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Texas, China and Saudi Arabia. We still keep in touch, helping each other and sharing resources. After graduating, I spent a month driving from Los Angeles to New York City. I crossed the center of the desert, down to the Mexican border – after stopping there to rest, I drove through all of Texas and passed the Great Smoky Mountains. I then lived in New York for half a year. I took on some shooting jobs and met new friends. At the end of my time there, I decided to visit the north of the country, staying in Chicago for about two months. My long trip ended up back in LA after driving back from Denver. This ultra-long road trip gave me plenty of inspiration and material, and I am currently planning on making a travel photo series about it.

In January 2014, I self-published my first photo book “04012013-07:58”. This book is a documentary-style story giving my inner impressions of city life. I used scenes from typical aspects of our concrete jungle, such as the functional designs and surveillance cameras that make people so uncomfortable. I also did a project in 2015 that talked about the relationship between the Manhattan Skyline and the huge cemeteries in Queens. 2016 marked a new beginning for me, and I now want to focus more on my hometown of Beijing, and to work on a mix of different media and materials.

Has it been a smooth road?
I have done a lot of event photography, such as the German Film Festival in the Egyptian Theatre, and the Millennium Campus Network at the United Nations. I also did interview photography for ELLEMEN China, the Shanghai Business Review, SELF and the New York Fashion Week. But in my heart, the photography I really want to do is fine art. Each commercial project I do enables me to meet more valuable partners and clients, and the profit opportunities from commercial photography are significantly greater than fine art photography at this point. But much like advertisements, in commercial photography you shoot something people want to see, whereas in fine art photography, you shoot something you want people to see. I have been discussing this with some of my friends: we all decided to continue the pursuit of fine art, and take it as a lifelong goal. It will be hard for us, because we have to take on many other types of work to support our passion. As a result, we need to work together as a team, absorbing like minded others and sharing our resources. Only in this way will we be strong enough to face future challenges.

What are some of the influences that have played the biggest role in your journey so far?
As part of the MFA program, there was a class called Historical Perspectives. It sounds boring, and it was. One day the instructor decided to do something a bit different. She devised a new kind of weekly assignment, asking everyone to write down a simple word they liked on a slip of paper, and then picking one at random. That word would then become the theme for the week’s assignment. Her rule was that students needed to reflect deeply, there could be no boring or predictable images, and copying was strictly prohibited. At that time, we only had a couple of days to finish the assignment. So if the word happened to be “aurora”, then everyone would start feeling anxious, especially as we were in the middle of southern California! But that was the purpose, forcing you to think hard from an internal perspective, and not only about the objects themselves. I believe that everything on this world has been shot before, and that the key lies in showing what makes YOUR story different from others. The unique story behind the image is much much more important than any formal innovation. Since then, I have always set myself similar assignments when faced with a lack of inspiration.

What type of clients or projects do you look forward to most?
At the moment, I am interested in projects that can combine different art forms. When reviewing my work, I sometimes get the feeling that my ideas could also become sculptures, installations or moving pictures. The problem is that I am no good at these art forms myself. But if there was a project that could combine multiple art forms, I would be very happy to be a part of it.

If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
I would like to say that everything I have done was important. If it turns later out that something was not as good as it could have been, I would prefer to change it in the future rather than trying to start over. In all honesty though, I wish I could have begun viewing everything with the eye of an artist much earlier. I missed many events, scenes, and opportunities that I thought nothing of at the time, but that when I think about today, I realize could have been very interesting themes. Sadly, I cannot go back.

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