I once read an entry in Georges Perec’s posthumously published notebooks that said simply, “Interrogate your teaspoons.” I couldn’t help thinking of Perec’s words several years later when, waiting for my luggage after a flight back to Hanoi, I found the conveyor belt to be occupied not by the usual bags, boxes and suitcases, but rather by a solitary teaspoon. It circulated contentedly, secure in the knowledge of the chain of events that had placed it on a luggage carousel at Noi Bai airport at two o’clock on a Sunday afternoon. I watched it for the next 20 minutes or so until my bag arrived, wishing there was some way I could get its story.

It’s the desire to interrogate the things, people, and processes that make up our everyday that underlies my work. Whether in my books, articles, or blog posts, I’m interested in uncovering stories and figuring out what they might mean. Some of the stories are textual and some visual, but all of them are part of an ongoing attempt to understand our world a little better.

Image copyright Mai Huyền Chi