Ophrys Apifera

Ophrys Apifera is a video sculpture that examines the nature of love as an inherently subjective act of projection and the relationship between the subject and the object of affection. At the center of a dark, empty room stands a pure white wedding dress sculpture. Two projectors cast colorful, dynamic imagery onto the dress and its flowing train, transforming it into a canvas for layered emotions and shifting visions.

The piece is named after Ophrys Apifera, a species of orchid whose flowers resemble a female bee. This flower attracts male bees for pollination through mimicry. However, the tragedy is that the bee it mimics is now extinct, and modern bees no longer recognize it. As a result, the orchid must self-pollinate, a process that lacks genetic diversity and may eventually lead to its extinction. The artist names the piece Ophrys Apifera as a reflection of empathy toward the orchid, which imagines the appearance of a lover and even transforms into that imagined appearance, even though the lover has long since disappeared from the world. And this orchid itself will be trapped in this imagination, detached from the entire ecosystem, and lonely as it moves toward its own end.

The human tendency to project one's imagination onto a lover mirrors the behavior of Ophrys Apifera in the story: both spontaneously project their imagination and immerse themselves in these projections, gradually falling into an inevitable end.

This piece was created in collaboration with Cheryl Huang & Madelyn Kellum.

All documentation photography by Yufei Ma.