Dai never had just one color. I learned that while creating The Spectrum Between Us, when I photographed thirty people through thirty different shades of the rainbow. I wanted Dai to be part of it, but somehow none of those individual colors felt quite like her. Then came Michigan Birds.
When Dai opened my bird books and landed on the Wood Duck—with its extraordinary collection of emerald green, midnight blue, turquoise, bronze, warm brown, and unexpected flashes of color—it suddenly made sense. Dai didn’t need one color. She needed the whole story.
And maybe that’s what this season of her life is asking of her too: not to simplify herself, but to soften into all the different pieces of who she is becoming.
How We Met
Dai Nguyen has been in my periphery for almost a decade. She was a longtime attendee of my Doc Nights, the weekly documentary screenings I used to host, and I came to know her through the particular kind of curiosity she brought into those rooms.
Dai can add a sparkle to a space with just a smile.
But she’s never been someone who needs to tell everyone exactly what’s happening inside of her. These days, she’ll tell you she’s thinking, dreaming, and occasionally creating in the privacy of her own world.
I’ve watched pieces of her emerge over the years through photography, ceramics, flow, and whatever creative curiosity catches her attention.
Every year it feels like she’s remembering a little more of her core self.
I think of Dai as the author of her own life—adding chapters, introducing a surprise twist, occasionally changing genres entirely, and never feeling obligated to explain the whole plot before she’s ready.
It’s pretty exciting to watch what’s emerging.
Why the Wood Duck
I originally reached out to Dai while I was creating The Spectrum Between Us, my 2025 ArtPrize portrait series built around thirty shades of the rainbow. But there was a problem. No single color felt like Dai. When I began creating Michigan Birds, I invited her again, and this time she told me she was interested in taking flight.
When Dai came to my studio, I watched her hands move across the fabrics while she flipped through my bird books. She could have chosen so many Michigan birds, but after taking her time, she landed on the Wood Duck. The range of colors caught her attention.
Of course it was.
We developed her look, and then something unusual happened: we waited. Dai took the pieces with her and had time to live with the colors before we photographed them. As the days passed, the Wood Duck began to feel even more fitting.
Dai eventually sent me a reflection she’d found about the Wood Duck that resonated with where she is right now: an invitation toward beauty, stillness, presence, creative renewal, authenticity, and a softer way of moving through life. One phrase especially stayed with me: gentle power.
Not power that needs to announce itself.
Not power that needs to prove anything.
The kind that knows when to move and when to rest. The kind that can be sensitive without mistaking sensitivity for weakness. The kind that allows itself to be colorful without needing to perform for anyone watching.
Dai chose the Wood Duck.
Then she gave herself enough time to understand why.
The Look
If The Spectrum Between Us couldn’t contain Dai in one color, the Wood Duck gave us permission to use many. We started with a Gold & Bronze wrinkle rayon wrap, tied into a flowing skirt. Around her waist, I added a Shiitake Mushroom rayon Wild Rag as a belt, bringing in another warm, earthy layer.
A Dances with Raisins rayon Wild Rag became her top, while a long Midnight Blue scarf gave her something dramatic to drape and move through the air. An Emerald Green rayon Wild Rag wrapped around her head brought in the Wood Duck’s unmistakable green, and Turquoise rayon bracelets added small flashes of brightness at her wrists.
There was a lot happening.
And somehow, on Dai, none of it felt like too much. The colors layered together like different pieces of a personality. Earthy and bright. Quiet and theatrical. Grounded and fluid. Dai looked dynamic and elegant in the draped fabrics, but I loved watching her discover how she wanted them to move. Her personality kept bubbling through.
The Session
I asked Dai where she imagined a Wood Duck might want to be photographed. She chose Reeds Lake at sunset. From there, the entire session became a race with the disappearing light. We followed the boardwalks along the water, chasing the sun as it dropped lower and lower. Dai kept finding somewhere else to go—a tree to climb, a fence to rest against, a quiet nook tucked among the roots along the lake.
At some point, I realized I felt like I was chasing after a princess who didn’t want to miss any of it.
So I followed.
That’s one of the things I love about photographing someone who is willing to play. The location stops being a backdrop and becomes part of the collaboration. Every bend in the path offers another possibility.
Dai flowed through all of it. Eventually it became so dark that I had to call the session, even though it felt like we could have kept exploring. We had chased the light until there wasn’t any left to chase.
Color Connection
The Wood Duck solved something I couldn’t solve when I first imagined photographing Dai. She isn’t one color.
There is gold-and-bronze warmth and Shiitake-Mushroom earthiness. There is the richness of Dances with Raisins, the depth of Midnight Blue, the vitality of Emerald Green, and the little sparks of Turquoise that appear when she moves.
Separately, each color tells only part of the story.
Together, they become Dai.
That’s what makes the Wood Duck such a beautiful bird for her. Its beauty doesn’t come from simplifying itself into a single defining color. It comes from the unlikely harmony of many colors existing side by side.
Maybe we’re allowed to be that complicated too.
Dai can be private and expressive. Thoughtful and playful. Still and flowing. She can make ceramics, take photographs, move her body, dream quietly, disappear into her own creative world for a while, and emerge with something new.
She doesn’t have to choose one color to prove she knows who she is.
Choosing the Frame
After most Power Portrait sessions, I go home with a lot of photographs. Not everyone wants to see them all. Sorting through every raw image can be tedious, so I often choose my favorite twenty or so and let that become the story.
Dai wanted to see everything.
She poured over the SD card with me, looking carefully at how her body moved from frame to frame. She helped find the photographs where the fabric flowed the way she remembered it flowing, where a pose felt like her, where the image captured what she had experienced from inside of it.
I loved that.
Michigan Birds has always been collaborative. I provide the fabrics, colors, bird books, camera, and an invitation to play—but I don’t want these portraits to simply be my interpretation of another person. I want people to make choices inside the world I’ve created. Dai did exactly that. She chose her bird. She lived with her colors. She chose how she wanted to move. And then she helped choose how that movement would be remembered.
For someone I think of as the author of her own life, it felt perfectly fitting. Dai wasn’t simply inside the frame. She helped decide what the frame would hold.
Gentle Power
Dai has moved through many seasons of growth, and this one feels different. There is something quieter about it. She doesn’t need to broadcast every internal shift as it happens. Some things are allowed to develop privately. Some dreams need time before they become declarations. Some creative impulses can exist simply because following them feels good.
Photography. Ceramics. Flow. Curiosity.
New chapters being written without needing to know exactly how the book ends.
The Wood Duck reflection Dai shared described a movement toward softness, beauty, stillness, emotional sensitivity, authenticity, and creative renewal. What struck me was that none of those things require her to become less powerful.
Perhaps they’re showing her another way power can feel.
Gentle power doesn’t mean making yourself smaller.
It can mean knowing yourself well enough that you no longer need to force the next chapter.
You can sit beside the water.
You can notice what catches your eye.
You can let yourself become curious.
And when something feels right, you can follow it.
Watching Dai move through the colors of the Wood Duck felt like watching someone give herself permission to do exactly that.
Join the Flock
Dai’s portrait is part of Michigan Birds ↗, my collaborative portrait and fashion series exploring identity, color, movement, and belonging through Michigan’s birds.
The portraits have all been taken now, but that doesn’t mean you’ve missed your chance to become part of the flock.
Throughout ArtPrize, I’ll be at Rewind on weekends from noon–6pm, helping people play with color and develop their own bird-inspired looks. Come find me, wrap yourself in something unexpected, discover a bird, and create a look that makes you want to fly.
Find Your Bird
None of us has to become the bird.
The bird simply gives us another way to see what’s already there.
For Dai, the Wood Duck revealed a spectrum I couldn’t fit into a single color.
A little stillness.
A little sparkle.
A lot of curiosity.
And a woman quietly authoring whatever comes next.
Come find your colors. Come find your bird. Come join the flock.
