Ruth Asawa, Tamarind Institute, Desert Plant, 1965, color lithograph on Rives Type IV paper, Gift of Dorothy J. and Benjamin B. Smith, 1983.18.177

Asian American Artists

The work of Asian American artists helps us tell a fuller story of America and its far-reaching connections.

Explore works by Isamu Noguchi, Hung Liu, Zarina Hashmi, Byron Kim, Baldwin Lee, Shahzia Sikander, and more. Listen to their processes, ideas, and stories in their own voices. 

Selected works

  • A rough-hewn block of basalt sits upright on a rectangular stone base on a pale pink stone floor against a stone wall. In this photograph, we are off the front left corner of the free-standing sculpture in a space filled with natural light. The tongue-shaped basalt is narrower from front to back and wider from side to side. It is about three times taller than it is wide at its widest. Some of the dark brown basalt running up the center of the block is smooth but most is pitted. Strips up either side have been carved to expose rough, copper-colored stone, some of which has flaked away. The tan stone base is speckled densely with gray, and the leaves of an indoor but mature tree bow into the top left corner of the photograph.
  • 560 panels, each painted a unique, flat color, are hung in a grid to create an abstract work of art. The grid has ten horizontal rows of fifty-six panels. The surface of each panel is covered from edge to edge with a single color. The colors range from mahogany to peach, almond white to dark brown. Some panels are smoothly painted while brushwork is visible on others.
  • Two cows stand side-by-side to our right with a path leading to a row of buildings in the distance to our left in this dreamlike, stylized landscape painting. The forms are simplified, angular, and blocky, and seem to be overlapping, though most of the shapes painted with blended strokes. To our right, a black cow stands beyond a brown cow, both facing our left in profile. The heads are triangular and come to exaggerated points under curving horns, and the ribs of the cow closer to us are painted with curving black lines down the body. Their legs also taper to exaggeratedly pointed, tiny hooves. A milk jug sits to our right, behind them. The row of five buildings to our left are created with blocks of white, golden yellow, brick red, and black. A sprig of leaves and a lacy white flower grow to our left on the row of oatmeal-brown rocks jutting up along the bottom edge of the composition. An abstracted shirt-like form floats to our left against the background of teal green that covers the bottom two-thirds of the painting. The area above the buildings is painted with a field of silvery charcoal gray. The artist signed and dated the painting with tiny letters under the brown cow: "Y. Kuniyoshi 23."

Stories

Article:  12 Documentary Photographers Who Changed the Way We See the World

Photographers of the 1970s revolutionized the medium through innovations of both style and subject.

Article:  Centering Asian Artists in the American Story

Asian Americans are often left out of view of US history. But their lives—and their art—are an essential part of the nation’s story.

Video:  Conversations with Artists: Binh Danh

Binh Danh (American, b. 1977, Vietnam) uses alternative printing techniques to explore the relationship between history, memory, and the landscape.

Article:  Poet Victoria Chang Responds to a Sculpture by Anne Truitt

The poet responds to a sculpture by Anne Truitt and asks the questions “Who gets to speak, who gets to brush.”

Article:  Ruth Asawa’s Little-Known Experiment with Printmaking

Memorialized in stamps for her wire sculptures, the artist’s experiments with printmaking have been largely forgotten.

Article:  Visionary Photographer Tseng Kwong Chi’s Vintage “Selfies”

Discover the artist's “East Meets West” series from the 1970s and 1980s exploring American identity and exclusion.

Article:  Who Is I. M. Pei? 10 Things to Know

Learn about the architect behind our iconic East Building.