The Photographic Ms. Chu
Agnes Chu likes to use her hands. When this frazzled FM reporter showed up at her door, Agnes greeted her with a “how are you doing?” and a warm shoulder rub that made me think we had been friends forever. A laid-back San Diego native, Agnes snuggled cozily on her bed, a few mattresses piled on top of each other without a frame, and began to talk candidly about her work in the VES department.
Her long fingers wave gracefully through the air as she describes her thesis—a cinematic representation of Oliver Sachs’ case study in which a man looses all personal memory. Agnes likes the hands-on process of making original films, in deciding every aspect of the moving pictures that challenge her as an artist.
“I’m not sure how good I am at it, but I definitely want to do something in the film industry,” says Agnes. ‘Something in the film industry’ could be striking out on her own and directing creative films that center around moving pictures rather than actors and dialogue or working on the administrative side of things at a hip film studio in New York City. Though somewhat hopeful that she will choose the managerial path, Agnes’ parents support her creative endeavors. And after seeing what she’s produced, why wouldn’t they?
One of Agnes’ photos graces the cover of the Advocate’s most recent issue. It is a glossy close-up of a few bright orange goldfish hanging in one of several plastic bags. It captures the feel of the tightly cramped street and the cheaply priced pets rather than identifying it as Fish St. in Hong Kong. While in Italy, Agnes chose to photograph what she found visually beautiful instead of snapping the traditional pix of ruins and statues. Not that those things aren’t fun to look at, it’s just that more often than not, Agnes decides to capture a “cloud in the sky or the way light falls on a color.”
She has managed to splash a bit of that color around her room with stylish knowhow. A random assortment of pop postcards are displayed among cultured pictures of her favorite arists including Man Ray and Klimt. There is a Brattle Theater schedule and ads from recent Dolce and Gabbana ads (Agnes was intrigued by the way the ad campaign changed from season to season—black and white photos of exotic women one minute and technicolor Westernized shots the next) On the personal side, Agnes keeps a picture of her boyfriend and her name written in Chinese characters at eye level. When she isn’t working on her film, Agnes, whose first language is Cantonese, spends her time boning up on Mandarin since she figured“might as well graduate from college knowing how to speak the main Chinese language.”
Poised to take the art world by storm, Agens Chu proves that posh style and a discerning eye can go hand in hand with a self-assured charm and intuition about the road ahead.