Yu-Wen Wu
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
Born 1958 Taipei, Taiwan; lives in Boston, Massachusetts
Gold Mountain Prayer, 2015; gold ink on rice paper 45 x 20 1/4 inches/114.3 x 51.44 cm
The population of immigrants from 1860 to 2010 (by decades) headed to San Francisco, to the so-called Gold Mountain, the gold fields, can be seen in the proliferation, and diminution of gold lotus blossoms depicted. This is a fitting image as the artist has written: In many Buddhist temples, a lotus light represents the light of a soul for which the monks offer prayers. We can see the effects on the Chinese population of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, and the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965. Each lotus in this drawing represents approximately 1,500 Chinese individuals.
From public art projects embracing communities to delicate, intimate, contemplative objects, Yu-Wen Wu’s work is shaped by the immigrant experience, the concept of identity, journey, and personal histories. A graduate degree at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston followed her BSc from Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. Her multi-dimensional of work has been shown across the country and has been collected by the Davis Art Museum, Wellesley College, Massachusetts and the Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.
Images courtesy of the artist
