The Impossibility of Love

  Curatorship Mônica Hoff • Pivô Art and Research, São Paulo, Brasil (2024)












Once, I asked my mother:  “What was around you different from ‘non-Asian’ families?” She replied, “The messiness”. This term reflects her experience growing up surrounded by accumulated objects, a cluttered museum of lost narratives that still pulse culture. The control over possessions through accumulation signifies an unwillingness to dispossess the self, yet it shows agency: to refuse to undo is to agree to preserve.

Chronicles of migration from China to Brazil, using objects collected, stolen, or inherited (1950–2024). The site-specific installation was created during residency at Pivô Arte e Pesquisa in São Paulo, Brazil


"The Impossibility of Love"
Hand-painted ceramics, reclaimed wood [family furniture], tulle, brass chains, photos of known and unknown relatives (China c. 1960—65), objects collected, stolen or inherited [dating from 1950—2024], chinese vases [Qing dynasty], dried leaves and flowers.

250 x 210 x 150 cm