#identity-and-representation

#identity-and-representation

Wary of being labelled, many Asian Americans once believed that the safest way to enter the art world was by making their identities invisible. But invisibility is fragile. After the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965-which abolished the discriminatory national quotas that had defined US immigration policy since the 1920s-many Asian artists arrived in New York and entered an art world already defined by hierarchy. For decades thereafter, downplaying identity could feel like survival. But what we try to sidestep is never separate from us.

CFGNY is having a big spring. The self-proclaimed 'vaguely Asian' art and fashion collective is in a group exhibition about the production and representation of Asian fashion at Pioneer Works, transforming the third floor into a cardboard-lined shipping container filled with studio portraits shot in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, a growing fashion hub.