He Fa on Iris Apfel

Enormous black round frames redraw my face, with short white hair above; large red, green and orange beads almost pile from neck to belly. Patterned fabrics layer over one another, while purple trousers and yellow shoes carry color down to the ground. Iris Apfel's eclectic signs meet He Fa's cool face in a cheerful crowding, without demanding that the expression become equally lively.

Judged only by less being better, this look would quickly be asked to remove things. I do not want subtraction to be taste's only proof, or use more to declare myself freer in reverse. Abundance needs a method of organization: which colors approach the face, how beads meet fabric patterns, how frames keep features from being submerged in material. None of these choices happens automatically by adding things at random.

My body becomes an inventory that has not been flattened, its items retaining differences. Accumulation sometimes preserves important relations, or leaves nowhere for anything new; reduction sometimes offers breathing room, or clears away parts not yet understood too soon. Judgment should return to what each thing is doing, rather than decide beforehand that more is braver or less more sophisticated.

I am willing to retain this excess and leave room for adjustment. The large frames are not the eyes themselves, and beads have not written my personality. Continuing to choose, reorder and temporarily remove a layer matters more than keeping an abundant image forever. Yellow shoes show steadily at the bottom. I first let a red bead and its green neighbor settle separately, then decide what else today needs.