BIOGRAPHY
ABOUT MIKEY CHANG
BASED in MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN. DIRECTING PROJECTS. VISUALIZING FILM IN PHOTO LENS. SINCE 2019
Chamenou Mikey Chang is a Milwaukee based Hmong Artist working with photography and digital art.
As a first-generation artist, Chang’s interdisciplinary practices delves into fictional story-telling that is used to explore different immigrant stories using photographic sequencing. Chang’s bodies of work as a Southeast Asian artist incorporates human relationships, environmental issues and immigration. Visually, Chang’s work combines photography and audio that uses special anamorphic aspect ratios to immerse viewers perception of space and place.
Chang served as an AI and Archival researcher in the Immersive Media Lab, where he cooperated with different agents and professionals about the influence of emerging technologies and ongoing practices.
He graduated with a Bachelors of Fine Arts (BFA) with a concentration in Photography & Imaging in Fall of 2023, from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee. He took part in an open exhibition at INOVA Gallery Kenilworth Square East featuring his recent work, Exodus; as well as other art sites like Walker's Point Center For The Arts (WPCA) and more.
Currently, Chang has branched off and now serves as a Medical Healthcare Professional in ophthalmology. On the side, he still continues his current line of work, Exodus; and much more.
The Reason
wHAT INSPIRES MIKEY?
"There is a lot to be inspired by; but I am mainly driven by film. Film was actually something I was supposed to go into, but there was something miraculous about the idea of suspension and how photos can stop time. Film and photo are very much inter-woven mediums. They both overlap each other, but have a clear distinction in their own respective ways. However, I am so driven by film and the many emotions that it can deliver. It is more than just a movie; it is a story that talks and imagines depending on what film that is. More over, it is emotion and the state of being. I carry a lot of that over to my photo sequences.
A lot of my work that you get to see on this page imagines both film and photo in such naturistic ways; even down to my commercial work with weddings and editorial. I am always viewing things in my head as I shoot. Although planning is important, most of my ideas come through the experience of shooting. So I never often plan poses for my models; nor do I rarely plan on how exactly things are handled when present. All of my images have such a cinematic feel to them, as if they were taken out from a film strip. I want my eyes to be your eyes when you see my work. Despite some work feeling small and intimate at time; they also feel larger than life. I am inspired by so many great directors and artists. But I am also inspired by myself, my family and being able to trust me eyes to guide my execution when creating."
~ Mikey Chang
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