Artist Profile Feijia Yu

Yu’s exquisitely balanced composition evidences a delicate synergy of love and loss.

Artist Statement

I came to Gray’s Beach on Valentine’s Day—a date marked by gestures of affection but also by the quieter reverberations of memory. The late winter light draped gently over the marsh, and in its hush, I found a small bouquet of artificial flowers resting near the boardwalk. It wasn’t just decoration. It was evidence—of someone’s love, someone’s loss, someone choosing this exact place to remember.

The wooden boardwalk at Gray’s Beach is more than a scenic path across the salt marsh—it is a public archive of private lives. Each plank beneath my feet bears a name carved into weathered wood: dedications, memorials, weddings, silent elegies. This place has been rebuilt after storms, preserved by a community that understands grief and love are not opposites but companions.

That day, with the wind rolling in from the bay and the marsh hushed by cold, I felt time settle in layers—1912 and 1978 and now—folded into one present moment. The boardwalk, which was first extended over a century ago, has become a pilgrimage site for scenic views and memories to take root. It invites people to return—not to relive the past but to walk alongside it.

I chose large-format films to honor the weight of these stories. The process is slow, deliberate, and reverent, like placing a flower on a bench or carving a name into timber. In that gesture—on that day—I witnessed how love lives in celebration and persistence. It outlasts seasons. It outlasts storms.

Gray’s Beach reminded me: we are temporary, but our love—if offered with intention—can leave marks that last. And sometimes, on a quiet February afternoon, the landscape answers back.

Artist Biography

Feijia Yu is a Chinese landscape photographer and now a Junior student at the School of Visual Arts (SVA). He primarily works with 4″ x 5″ color large format film. Through photographing landscapes, he conveys a unique emotional experience to the viewer. He dedicates about a week to the creation of each piece, incorporating the local cultural background into his images. As a result, each photograph allows viewers to read a story, glimpse a culture, and feel an emotion.