Read Your Photography turns its attention to the stories behind each photograph—the stories that cannot be encountered through looking alone. Alongside works gathered through cizucu’s photo poster project and social media, cizucu Magazine translates the circumstances in which each photograph was created, as well as the personal moments it preserves, into 12 languages and shares them with audiences around the world.
Keeping a story close to your heart is one choice. Yet its emotions may quietly touch someone else and inspire a sense of wonder not yet imagined.
[FACT CHECK REQUIRED] This feature presents works by five artists from around the world.
Let us take a gentle look into these singular stories.
robot__photo’s Story
Photograph by robot__photo
robot__photo
📚 01
I made this photograph at Dapingding Park in Kaohsiung.
When the flowering season arrives, brilliant red royal poinciana blossoms fill the landscape, transforming an everyday scene into something slightly extraordinary.
Amid this vivid scenery, I noticed a father quietly watching over his daughter as she played. There was a gaze that communicated without words and a protective presence surrounding her from a short distance away. Between parent and child, a quiet and tender moment unfolded.
The scene also resonated with memories of my own childhood: the time I spent with my parents, the reassurance of being protected, and the profound presence of those who watched over me as I grew. Beneath the fleeting moment preserved in this photograph, I sense an enduring love for family and an emotion akin to gently embracing time that has passed.
cizucu Editorial Team
Beneath the red royal poinciana blossoms, a quiet moment belongs solely to a parent and child. Their measured distance seems to bring together the tenderness of watching over someone and the warmth of remembering what it felt like to be protected. This work reminds us that photography can portray someone else’s present while gently touching our own past. Even the path extending into the depths of the frame seems to watch quietly over the time that lies ahead.
Ricky’s Story
Photograph by Ricky
Ricky
📚 02
This overwhelming scene suddenly unfolded before me at Mount Caomao, shortly before a high-wind warning was issued in Iceland.
The atmosphere and presence I experienced there were so immense that this photograph captures only a fraction of them.
The form appeared almost like an unidentified flying object concealed behind the clouds. Driven by the raging wind, it assumed an even more merciless and overpowering presence.
Standing before it, I felt the insignificance of human existence.
All I could do was look upon that moment with awe and record it.
cizucu Editorial Team
The clouds surging dramatically across the sky convey nature’s overwhelming scale and irresistible force. The composition leaves room to imagine even the atmosphere that could not be contained within the frame, evoking an emotion akin to fear rather than beauty alone. We can also sense Ricky’s quiet tension as he released the shutter, even while confronted by the sheer force of the landscape before him.
王祥宇’s Story
Photograph by 王祥宇
王祥宇
📚 03
In 2016, I took my final journey as a student: a graduation trip to Hakone.
Standing at the very front of the Hakone Tozan train, I continued photographing the scenery through the window.
There were sharp curves, steep gradients, and switchbacks reminiscent of Taiwan’s Alishan Forest Railway. To keep photographing inside the heavily swaying carriage, I had to steady not only my hands but my entire body.
At that moment, a friend silently stood behind me and supported my body with both hands.
Because of that support, I could remain at ease and concentrate on photographing until the end, allowing me to preserve this particular frame.
Car No. 103, pictured in the photograph, was subsequently retired in 2019.
A photograph does more than simply record a moment. It can recall what happened in a place, the connections shared between people, and even the atmosphere surrounding them. Without this photograph, the unremarkable events and beautiful memories of that day might gradually have dissolved into the passage of time.
cizucu Editorial Team
The red carriage evokes more than the exhilaration of a graduation trip. The presence of the friend who gently offered support inside the swaying train, as well as the photographer’s regard for Car No. 103 as it approached retirement, quietly endure beneath the surface of this work. The photograph suggests that even time passing without ceremony begins to shine as an irretrievable memory from the moment it is preserved in an image.
In Closing
What did you think?
We want to turn our attention to the qualities that cannot be fully expressed through visuals alone. Read Your Photography is an editorial series that considers the thoughts and emotions held within a photograph, receiving them as a story in their own right.
What appears in the frame is only a fleeting instant. Yet beneath it lies time that has undeniably continued to flow, along with emotions that were never put into words.
We invite you to experience each photograph as though reading it—and as though turning the pages of a book.
How to Join
From time to time, cizucu posts a photography theme on Threads.
Simply reply with one of your works that speaks to the theme.
There is only one participation requirement: follow cizucu on social media 💙
From among the submitted works,
selected artists will receive a message from the cizucu Editorial Team!
Read Your Photography also features works exhibited through cizucu’s photo poster project (ppp).
A ppp exhibition may be taking place in your country as well. Encounters connected by nothing more than a shared love of photography are now unfolding around the world.