The Lovebugs: Part IV artist statement

The Lovebugs: Part IV

Artist Statementby Amelia C. Williams

This installation is like walking directly into my mind—an immersive snapshot of limerence: that obsessive, all-consuming stage of desire, fantasy, and projection. The space hums with tension between longing and reality, between what we see and what we live.

The visuals are layered with references from my favorite early 2000s indie romance films—those soft-lit stories of aching connection and youth. Intertwined is a teaser from The White Cloth, a documentary I’m developing that explores the complexity of growing up mixed-race in a predominantly white environment. The contrast between these elements is intentional: one represents the media and culture I absorbed, the other, the experience of navigating that same world in a body that didn’t quite belong.

This work lives in that friction—between romance and erasure, between fantasy and identity. It is a collage of memory, aesthetics, and emotional residue. A messy, tender offering of what it felt like to be shaped by both the image and the absence of myself.