Artist Talk at MGH Staff Meeting
May 7, 2025
What I talked about
I was honored to be invited to give a 30-minute talk during the MGH staff meeting. I shared some of my personal journey—from growing up on the Loess Plateau, to living along the coastlines of Shanghai, and later settling in New England. These places, and the transitions between them, shape how I see the world.
Moving between such different landscapes helped me develop a deep sensitivity to nature and to the environments that hold us. That sensitivity has become a quiet but constant drive in my art practice.
Land, water, and memory
Over time, I've become more and more interested in the relationship between people, land, and water. Through drawing, I explore how we interact with nature, how we care for it—or fail to—and how land carries memory.
As an artist working between personal memory and geographic distance, moving between China and Massachusetts, I keep asking: how can intimate, personal references open up wider conversations about ecology, history, conservation, and identity? Where is the balance between the personal and the collective?
Connecting with the MGH community
I also spoke about how this work connects to the MGH community. After participating in the 2024 AAPI celebration at MGH, I felt how welcoming and supportive this space is. It means a great deal to return and share something personal with a community that values stories and cultural reflection.
MGH has done so much to support inclusion and representation, and it feels like an ideal place to reflect on heritage, raise awareness of AAPI voices—locally and beyond—and remember landscapes and histories that can easily be overlooked. My work is one small way of connecting memory and environment, and I'm grateful to be able to share it here.
What I talked about
I was honored to be invited to give a 30-minute talk during the MGH staff meeting. I shared some of my personal journey—from growing up on the Loess Plateau, to living along the coastlines of Shanghai, and later settling in New England. These places, and the transitions between them, shape how I see the world.
Moving between such different landscapes helped me develop a deep sensitivity to nature and to the environments that hold us. That sensitivity has become a quiet but constant drive in my art practice.
Land, water, and memory
Over time, I've become more and more interested in the relationship between people, land, and water. Through drawing, I explore how we interact with nature, how we care for it—or fail to—and how land carries memory.
As an artist working between personal memory and geographic distance, moving between China and Massachusetts, I keep asking: how can intimate, personal references open up wider conversations about ecology, history, conservation, and identity? Where is the balance between the personal and the collective?
Connecting with the MGH community
I also spoke about how this work connects to the MGH community. After participating in the 2024 AAPI celebration at MGH, I felt how welcoming and supportive this space is. It means a great deal to return and share something personal with a community that values stories and cultural reflection.
MGH has done so much to support inclusion and representation, and it feels like an ideal place to reflect on heritage, raise awareness of AAPI voices—locally and beyond—and remember landscapes and histories that can easily be overlooked. My work is one small way of connecting memory and environment, and I'm grateful to be able to share it here.