A sequel to Wei Weng’s first book Eat A Chili (2021), Water Refuge continues to explore the primal appetite for thrill-seeking via intense sensory experience. Weng’s richly layered photographs and beguiling narrative are influenced by the Chinese and Danish literary worlds which have informed her multivalent practice, and now traveling from burning capsaicin spice to immerse readers in frigid northern sea landscapes, Water Refuge carries the coming of age story of Eat a Chili over the fluid cusp of time and spatial imagination.
A young man is startled by the sight of an aging caretaker working below the sea, and the choice between Ocean Mother or the land-bound world becomes a matter of destiny.