Date of Award

2025

Document Type

MA Project - Restricted Access (SIA Only)

Project Type

MA Project - Curatorial Proposal

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Art Business

First Advisor

Agnes Berecz

Second Advisor

Leo Krakowsky

Abstract

In the age of globalization, the art world has been influenced by the flux of diaspora and diasporic artists who create their art based on unique migratory experiences. When personal encounters involve geographical resettlements, cultural integration and identity issues follow and are revealed in the art making of artists under this category. Duality: Preserving Chinese Identity in the West specifically concentrates on artists of Chinese descent from several Western countries in generations, pondering the essential meaning of maintaining one’s ethnic identity and Chinese-ness in the West through their art practices. This exhibition selects seventeen artworks from nine artists, from paintings, and photography to ceramics and installation, scheduled to exhibit from April 10th, 2025 through September 30th, 2025. Despite being raised in different Western countries, many exhibiting artists now live and work in New York City. The suggested venue for holding the exhibition is the Museum of Chinese in America, whose goals align with the purpose of the exhibition in celebrating diversity and fostering understanding of Chinese in America to broader audiences and communities. Chinese diasporic art, tracing back from the Republican era to the present, has a long history with complex transformation regarding intentions, missions, ideologies and visual styles on the integration of the East and West. Transitioning from the time when artists seeking new possibilities in reforming traditional Chinese ink art and employing Western techniques as means; and the time many artists went abroad for more artistic freedom and exhibition opportunities during the 1980s, to the contemporary diaspora happened after 2001 due to the economic prosperity in China, there is a group of diaspora artists demonstrating different ideas and characteristics in expressing their Chinese-ness. In comparison to their fellow artists born and raised in China, these artists were born and raised in the West as second or third-generation 3 diaspora, which leads to the accentuation of Chinese identity as a vital part in their practices. With few or no personal connections to the cultural and social realities of the motherland, they managed to shift their focus to the situated land and question the controversial realities they face in their diasporic lives. The exhibiting artists and their works all showcase new understandings of what it means to be Chinese and a minority group in Western societies from various perspectives. Martin Wong and Reagan Louie as the generation of baby boomers, both obtained their artistic inspiration from Chinatown; while Reagan Louie later went to China to seek the authenticity of the motherland, letting him counteract the broad definition of Asian American. Susan Chen and Stephanie. H. Shih expresses identity by placing their attachments to ethnic foods. Dominique Fung and Michael Ho, on the other hand, reexamine Western art history and popular cultures to resist the fetishization and narratives of Orientalism. Livien Yin and Lap-See Lam reiterate narratives in early immigration history and stories, connecting generational memories and representation of Chinese. Oscar yi Hou expresses the sense of in-betweenness through the combination of English poetry and Chinese cultural symbols, reclaiming duality in his works. Through these unique lenses, the conception of Chinese-ness has been expanded and redefined to adapt to the evolution of the Chinese diaspora.

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