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MAIDENS BY THE POOL
Maidens by the Pool reimagines a recurring nightmare as a site of unresolved beauty and disquiet. Water, both reflective and volatile, becomes a medium for emotional distortion rather than calm. Originating from a vision of golden dragons razing a village, the series reconstructs the dream’s aftermath — not as peace restored, but as suspended tension. The dragons have vanished, yet their absence lingers in the stillness, an atmosphere heavy with what cannot be undone.

Through digital assembly, the work examines how violence imprints itself on collective memory, how serenity can mask psychic residue. The maidens’ assembly around the pool evokes ritual without resolution, echoing the cyclic nature of trauma and its aesthetic sublimation. Maidens by the Pool questions whether beauty can ever be disentangled from devastation — or if it merely shimmers above its surface.


Artist
Pearlyn Lii
Alexandra Darby (Art Director), Kyle Chang (Assistant), Jon-Luke Fillippi (Producer), Dylin Bumpus (Crew)


︎Collected by @ElisabethJohs on Foundation


3600 × 4800
✺ Various images composited together


 
Special thanks to
Luis Fillippi, Kayla Fillippi, Diego Marini, Connie Lui, Denize Maaløe, Krystal Greven