xref

Amy Poon

In AutoCAD, a computer-aided design and drafting software, xrefs are external references to supporting files that are linked to the main or active drawing. One drawing can reference many other files, layer and display them as if they are one.

Here, xref is a collection of digital images taken during my local and global travels from the past decade, juxtaposed and interspersed with short stories of fragmented “home” memories that had occurred at different times and spaces than the ones captured in the visual elements.

Actual locations of where events or experiences take place are irrelevant. We are the active component that assign meanings to places, connecting the dots between memories and spaces we occupy. A space merely provides us with sensorial clues, provoking our thoughts and memories. In fact “home” can be anywhere; it is the subtle details at each place that remind us of familiarity or something from the past. Even if we fail to draw parallels or resonate, fragments of “home” can often be found internally within ourselves.

On the weekends, my parents often brought me to various recital, dance, and theatre performances at the Hong Kong Cultural Center in Tsim Tsa Tsui. Despite my mom requesting that I should hold onto her hands always, I loved roaming around the wide low rising stairs and running my fingers through the undulating bumps of the pale pink textured tiles. If I behaved well, we would visit the quirky gift shop tucked at the corner.

The grand atrium was a fascinating place with endless curiosities for my 6 year old self.

Being barely awake, I got hurried by our Filipino nanny Fay to change into the perfectly ironed white cotton uniform with the little blue tie and plastic belt. Soon after she handed the aubergine Jansport backpack to me.

Surrounded by high rise residential towers along the northern slope of Mount Parker, we climbed uphill and waited at the designated paved plaza for my school bus’s arrival. Other kids, heading to the same primary school, were also half-awakened standing and whining at their caregivers.

Why would that car think they could make it before a streetcar stops and opens the doors? Also was that person trying to jaywalk to catch this ride? There was literally another streetcar two lights behind, coming in a few minutes.

There used to be a gravel parking lot with a few painted tree trunks along the sidewalk for photo op, and now it turned into a yellow brick MEC store. Thankfully, Peter Pan was still around. Queen West really changed every time I passed by.

Sandwiched between two movable yet heavy white partitions on the loft of a former silk mill and current architecture school in Galt, it was nerve wracking to have my first design critique with guest lecturers. The project was to design a small learning centre with overnight accommodation at a site along the Grand River.

As I explained my ideas away with drawings featuring elements of elevated exterior walkways, sliding doors, and framed views, a prof in the panel suggested looking into Katsura Imperial Villa as a reference.

Later in the library, I blankly stared at the black and white plans and pixelated photos from the old musky hardcover book. As a first year student, I didn’t quite understand at the time.

With backgrounds in architecture, critical sexuality, and gender studies, Amy Poon is a wayfinding/signage designer and a masters student in the York-Ryerson Joint Graduate Program in Communication and Culture. Her research interests include cultural studies, experiential design, intersectional identities, and urban environments. She enjoys documenting her surrounding and translating lived experiences through sketching, photography, and graphic design. Her iphonetography can be found at @threequartertranslation.

Inspired by personal experiences of living as a queer identified East Asian cis-female in cities under various stages of (post)coloniality and/or globalization since childhood, Amy is currently exploring visual/spatial representations of “home” through this research project.