| The beating heart is warm, soft, and vulnerable. It is protected in the rib cage consisting of twenty-four ribs. We announce the end of a life by the sentence “His/her heart stopped beating,” which shows the importance of the heart. The heart is amazing, although it’s only an organ of the human body. We say to the one we love, “You are my sweet heart,” “my heart is throbbing for you.” We say “where there is a will in our heart, there is a way to succeed,” “we should love and think with all our heart.” What on earth is the heart? Perhaps only the word “soul” is the closest in meaning to the heart in its essence. We guard our heart to avoid getting hurt. We are used to masking our feelings when meeting people. Sometimes we even forget the heart exists. | 
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Fu Min is a Beijing-based artist.
Fu Min, House Beautiful, 2008. 300 cm x 80 cm. Courtesy of the Fifth Element Gallery.The beating heart is warm, soft, and vulnerable. It is protected in the rib cage consisting of twenty-four ribs. We announce the end of a life by the sentence “His/her heart stopped beating,” which shows the importance of the heart.
The heart is amazing, although it’s only an organ of the human body. We say to the one we love, “You are my sweet heart,” “my heart is throbbing for you.” We say “where there is a will in our heart, there is a way to succeed,” “we should love and think with all our heart.” What on earth is the heart? Perhaps only the word “soul” is the closest in meaning to the heart in its essence. We guard our heart to avoid getting hurt. We are used to masking our feelings when meeting people. Sometimes we even forget the heart exists.
When I stroll along the streets of Beijing at night, watch the sun at dusk casting its glow over the wall of my living room, or look far into the trees by the lake from the window of my apartment, so much unfolds before my eyes—the beauty of the material world, how the world watches the crowds in silence. The crowds are like moving shadows and the shadow of shadows…. I can see so clearly their enveloped hearts beating with the same fervor and desire.
The people in these photographs are my family and friends. They were sitting in front of me when I took the pictures. I saw where their hearts were. At a certain moment when their hearts were touched, they were engulfed by emotions, and I recorded these precious moments with my photography. The heart beats and brings warmth and new meaning into our lives. Isn’t this an image of “realism of heart?”
