The “Lost and Found” works, which are on view at the museum, are still in development because Liu describes the series as a lifelong project. These sculptures comprise pristine books—each one covered in fine, colored fabrics—which Liu acquired after a printing house in Italy had thrown them away. Inside the books, she cuts into the pages, carving out holes that are just big enough to house objects found on the street, such as colorful electrical wires, a crushed can, or a Tic Tac container.

“I would see [discarded] things on the ground and pick them up,” Liu said of the origin of the series. “I actually felt sorry for things thrown on the ground or discarded, and it sort of just broke my heart. I made it a point of picking things up, and I used to put them in a box, but I started putting them in books.”

The process, Liu noted, was more difficult than she’d expected: “My fingers would be raw from cutting these pages,” she said. Once the objects are glued into place, and the books can be opened to reveal them, “there’s this discovery of the objects as beings,” Liu said, “as living and breathing things and they seemed very pleased to have a place of safety.”