cát nguyên

the waves ~ they weave
(2024)

we are peoples of the water: two diasporas who live the same sun & body the same ocean.

it is the pacific that breathes our stories of origin, of separation & reunion, of kinship as filipinx and vietnamese. the waves, they weave a queerness into our movement between genders & migration beyond selves; how they texture our skin liminal, limitless, timeless; how they fabric our imagination with a thousand blazing horizons.

we are peoples of the water: we are as free as we are fluid; we are as divine as we are eternal; we are weavers of radical, boundless dreams; we are the wildest waves of our ancestors and descendants.

concept: cát nguyên
artistic direction: cát nguyên & blaine valencia
photography: blaine valencia
models: cát nguyên & valedictorian
styling: cát nguyên & valedictorian
make-up & wig artist: valedictorian

haunted by dust
(2023)

this photoshoot is an encounter with the phantoms still lurking in the shadows of my family’s refugee story. as a child of the vietnamese diaspora, i was born into a void of uprootedness. when i was twenty years old, i finally came face-to-face with sài gòn, the city where my parents buried their childhood.

nearly seven years later, i would come back, desperate to find answers to my origins; but how does one solve a puzzle when all the missing pieces have already dissolved into dust? after all, memory is like a fruit, sugar sweet until all that remains is the carcass. so i learned to grieve for a fruit i never even tasted.

concept & artistic direction: cát nguyên & nhật huỳnh-vũ
photography: nhật huỳnh vũ
photo editing: cát nguyên
outfit: valedictorian
styling: cát nguyên

inner child (2023)

tết trung thu (mid-autumn festival) is a traditional vietnamese harvest festival where children’s faces are illuminated by star lamps, paper lanterns, and the full moon. this annual celebration is an opportunity for families to gather, spend time together & feast on mooncakes.

for this queer, vietnamese diaspora-inspired photoshoot, i reconnected with my inner child – bíbo, the pet name my family gave me. i bathe in the moonlight of my memories: there is joy & abundance during my early years, the rainbows my bà ngoại and parents color my universe with, that same radiance from their very own childhood lantern processions. at the same time, deep edges in the charcoal sky remind me of the nightmares of my youth: living amongst the ghosts of our intergenerational trauma, i am shattered by the war leaking from my father’s rage & violence, crumbling underneath the rubble of our dysfunctional family. the reality is that my inner child co-exists with these two life forces & bíbo always chases the warmth of the moon.