This artwork was created in a moment of upheaval and uncertainty. When I lost my work visa, I also lost my home in the UK, the life I had built, my daily routines, my sense of stability and a part of my identity.
My life and future with my partner Paola had suddenly become undefined. We decided to move to the Italian coast, not out of desire but survival. It was a way to buy time, to stay together, to keep life from breaking apart entirely and losing myself completely.
In that in-between space, I turned to making images as a way to endure and create something beautiful from the pain. To voice myself from this undefined position was a crucial part of my healing.
What began as a simple vision, carrying a bouquet into the sea, became the anchor for a series that holds our story. The flowers were already fading yet still alive. Placed in water, in unknown territory, they became both fragile and resilient, a metaphor for us in that moment.
The photographs record our attempts to stay afloat, to preserve love and tenderness in the face of uncertainty. Each piece carries a different weight and mirrors our evolution throughout this state of flux:
1) Colour film for what was immediate and raw
2) Cyanotype for what was heavy and fading
3) A negative suspended like something half-vanished but still bold
4) Sheer fabric for what was settling and shifting
These material choices reflect how each memory holds differently and the evolving stages of vulnerability. How love can remain steady when exposed to the elements of life, how beauty can blossom from grief, and how art becomes a vessel for survival.
The work is accompanied by a poem written by Paola, surfacing the quiet resilience and recounting our journey through the images:
The water pulled us in,
cold and unsteady.
Still we held the flowers high,
keeping them safe from the tide.
Drifting in the blue,
scattered across the sands.
Exhausted yet steady,
we endured the salt in our wounds.
When the waves pressed over us,
we pushed through the negative.
Lifting what was precious,
beyond the storm’s reach.
And though the tide kept rising,
we rose with it.
Our love carried above the water,
a quiet strength refusing to let go.
Together, the photographic series and poem trace the act of holding onto beauty, love, and to each other when everything else was sinking. ‘What We Held Above the Water’ is both a document of loss and navigating the storms of life, as well as a declaration of resilience and a voice from the undefined, where love itself became a way to resist and survive.
Evelyn Liao is a Taiwan-born, UK-based photographer. She grew up in Taipei and moved to Leeds in 2019 to complete a Master’s in Applied Translation Studies. With a background in crafting words, she turned to images during the pandemic, when her mother gave her a film camera that sparked her analogue practice.
Her early work in street photography captured the outward flow of city life, while her recent project turns inward, tracing personal narratives of belonging, resilience, and love. Evelyn’s photographs linger on the quiet, often overlooked moments of daily life, holding them with the same care she gives to words.
