Like most Chicagoans, Jin enjoyed Lake Michigan in a general way for many years. But because the lake is consistently present—a backdrop to the spectacle of the city—it’s possible for residents to forget the lake is even there.

“At some point, I realized I wanted to get to know the lake better, and in order to do that, I needed to photograph it over a long period of time,” Jin says. For some artists, a summer might have sufficed. But part of Jin’s method is to make deep commitments to certain subjects. So, once a week for the next five years, she traveled to a single location on Lake Michigan so she could take photographs.

“Part of what interests me is starting to pay attention to a certain thing and then therefore start to see it. Some of it has to do with curiosity, some with chance encounter,” Jin says. And sometimes the need to study something for a long time “has to do with the sheer complexity of the subject matter.”