Tiger Strikes Asteroid New York is pleased to present Gathering, co-curated by Cecile Chong and Sophia Ma. The exhibition highlights the relationships between forty-five Asianish artist members and their works at Tiger Strikes Asteroid New York (Sat, June 24 - Sun, July 30, 2023) and FiveMyles in Crown Heights (Sat, July 8 - Sun, August 13, 2023).

Artists exhibiting at Tigers Strikes Asteroid are: Heejung Cho, Rachelle Dang, Gi (Ginny) Huo, Sara Jimenez, Melissa Joseph, Kyoung eun Kang, Ae Yun Kim, zavé martohardjono, Kristel Baldoz, & Andrew Suseno, Sa'dia Rehman, Pauline Shaw, Winnie Sidharta Ambron, Maria Stabio, and Jia Sung

Public programs

● Sat, Jul 8, 2PM - Live & Virtual Community Tour with curator Cecile Chong
● Sat, Jul 22, 4:30PM - Performance of three finger salute by zavé martohardjono, Andrew Suseno, & Kristel Baldoz

In March 2018, Sara Jimenez, Maia Cruz Palileo, Gabriel de Guzman, and Cecile Chong formed Asianish, an informal group of AAPI artists and art professionals, to create a safe space for a community of varying Asian identities. Since then, they have continued to gather around conversation, art, and food to share vulnerably and openly about code-switching in art contexts and the need for belonging in a country they call home. When the pandemic hit, a global reckoning of racial injustice arose along with the terrifying increased attacks on Asian Americans. The group shifted, like the rest of the world, and became a virtual monthly gathering to hold space for discourse around one another’s concerns and lived experiences. By early 2021, the meetings became weekly, which alternated between artist presentations and discussions on thoughtful anti-racist scholarship. Gathering celebrates the comradery developed over these trying years.

Gathering is, therefore, an unsurprising title and theme for a show of Asianish members who gather! Chong and Ma, a fellow Asianish member, invited the entire group of about a hundred to join the show in an open call—they received enthusiastic responses from nearly half the group. Four sub-themes around gathering emerged with many of the artists’ work illustrating more than one. In no particular order, they are:

●Meditation and self- and community-reflection on COVID feelings. Artists created works that acknowledge and help process anti-Asian hate.

● Familial and cultural hi/stories and folklore as the basis for connection.

● Domestic objects and the illusion of home life as the gathering point.

● Fragmentation and reassembly as the formation of something new.

The show is not necessarily about the member’s identities, but rather why they choose to gather. Their claim to the “-ish” in their Asianish experience is theirs alone. The group assembles for connection, visibility, and a place for their experiences and voices to be heard. This exhibition reveals the deep friendships between the artists and the intersections in their work.

The exhibition is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Arts Development Fund of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, administered by Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC) and the Asian Women Giving Circle, a donor-advised fund of the Ms. Foundation for Women. Tiger Strikes Asteroid’s programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. The co-curators thank the staff of FiveMyles and the artist members of Tiger Strikes Asteroid for their efforts.

For more information https://www.instagram.com/asianish2018/