About

 
Short Bio

Christine Wong Yap is a visual artist and social practitioner who works in community engagement, drawing, printmaking, publishing, textiles, and public art. Through her hyperlocal participatory research projects, she gathers and amplifies grassroots perspectives on belonging, resilience, and mental well being. She is a 2025 Creative Capital Awardee. From 2023 to 2024, she served as Neighborhood Visiting Artist at Stanford University (Stanford, CA). She has developed projects with the Chinese Culture Center of San Francisco, For Freedoms, the Library Foundation of Los Angeles, the Othering and Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley, Times Square Arts, and the Wellcome Trust, among others. Holding a BFA and MFA in printmaking from the California College of the Arts, she lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area, after a decade of living in New York City.


Longer Bio

Christine Wong Yap is a visual artist and social practitioner who works in community engagement, drawing, printmaking, publishing, and public art. Through her hyperlocal participatory research projects, she gathers and amplifies grassroots perspectives on belonging, resilience, and mental well being.

Recently, she has served as Creative Citizenship Fellow at the California College of the Arts (San Francisco, CA) and Neighborhood Visiting Artist at Stanford University (Stanford, CA). She developed a cross-cultural social practice project with working-class immigrant women resulting in the first contemporary art project in the San Francisco Chinese New Year Parade. The Cantor Arts Center (Stanford, CA) and Montalvo Arts Center/Institute of Contemporary Art San José (San José, CA) commissioned new projects for their exhibitions. She served as artist-in-residence with the Library Foundation of Los Angeles/Los Angeles Public Library and the Wellcome Trust (New York, Berlin, Tokyo, and Bengaluru). She also taught at Haystack School of Mountain Crafts (Deer Isle, ME).

Her work has been exhibited at venues such as the Berkeley Art Center (Berkeley, CA), Bronx Museum of Art (Bronx, NY), Cantor Arts Center (Stanford, CA), Chinese Arts Centre (also known as Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art / esea contemporary; Manchester U.K.), Chinese Cultural Center of San Francisco, John Michael Kohler Arts Center (Sheboygan, WI), Los Angeles Public Library, Palo Alto Art Center (Palo Alto, CA), Queens Museum of Art (Queens, NY), Times Square Arts (NYC), Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art (San Francisco), and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco), as well as in Bangalore, India; Los Angeles; Manila, Philippines; and Portland, OR. Her artworks have been displayed on billboards and digital screens in Atlanta, Chicago, London, New York City, Omaha, and Toruń, Poland, as well as over 400 bus stops and kiosks in Boston and Chicago.

She has worked with, learned from, and amplified perspectives from diverse publics, such as Chinese- and Spanish-speaking working-class women in San Francisco; seniors in midtown Manhattan; middle school students in Sheboygan, WI; residents and cultural workers in San Francisco Chinatown and Manilatown; and families who have experienced homelessness in Albuquerque, NM.

She is a 2025 Creative Capital Awardee. An honoree of the 2020 YBCA 100, she has been awarded grants from the Queens Council on the Arts, the Jerome Foundation, and the Center for Cultural Innovation. With Christine as lead artist, partner organizations have been awarded grants from the NEA and the Kenneth Rainin Foundation.

She has served as a visiting artist at the California College of the Arts (San Francisco), California State University Monterey Bay, Ox-Bow School of Art (Saugatuck, MI), Stanford University, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison. She has delivered keynote lectures at the Social Justice Teach-in at California Polytechnic State University (San Luis Obispo, CA) and the Arts In Your Classroom conference at Montalvo Arts Center (Saratoga, CA).

She has participated in over 20 artist residencies, studio programs, and fellowships at c3:initiative (Portland, OR), California College of the Arts (San Francisco, CA), Center for Book Arts (NYC), the City of Berkeley (Berkeley, CA), esea contemporary (formerly Chinese Arts Centre, Manchester U.K.), Harvester Arts (Wichita, KS), Headlands Center for the Arts (Sausalito, CA), Kala Art Institute (Berkeley, CA), Library Foundation of Los Angeles & Los Angeles Public Library (Los Angeles, CA), Little Paper Planes (at Minnesota Street Project studios; San Francisco, CA), Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (Governor’s Island, NY & Lower Manhattan, NY), Montalvo Arts Center (Saratoga, CA), Othering & Belonging Institute (formerly the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society) at U.C. Berkeley (Berkeley, CA), Palo Alto Art Center (Palo Alto, CA), Sanitary Tortilla Factory (Albuquerque, NM), Tides Institute and Museum of Art (Eastport, ME), Times Square Arts (New York, NY), Wellcome Trust (NYC, Berlin, Tokyo, Bengaluru), and Woodstock Byrdcliffe (Woodstock, NY).

Christine and her practice has appeared in outlets including Art Practical, Artforum, ArtNews, CNN, The Guardian, Girls Magazine, Hyperallergic, KQED, Los Angeles Times, National Geographic, New York Magazine, New Yorker Magazine, New York Times, Oakland Tribune, Oprah.com, San Francisco Chronicle, SFMOMA’s Open Space blog, Sing Tao Daily, White Hot Magazine, and World Journal. She has contributed to books published by the Headlands Center for the Arts, INCA Press, Montalvo Art Center, Montez Press, New Press, New York University Press, Routledge, and Workman Publishing. She is one of 12 “host-heroes of belonging” in Design for Belonging by Susie B. Wise (Ten Speed Press/Stanford d.school, 2022).

Yap holds a BFA and MFA in printmaking from the California College of the Arts. She was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she continues to live and work, following a decade of living in New York City from 2010 to 2021.

  • Born in California. Lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Education

  • 2007
  • MFA. California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA.
  • 1998
  • BFA with High Distinction. California College of the Arts, San Francisco, CA.

Solo Shows and Projects

Selected Public Projects

Selected Group Exhibitions

Collections

  • Alameda County Art Collection, Alameda County, CA.
  • The Center for Book Arts, NYC.
  • Montage Health Foundation, Monterey, CA.

Selected Visiting Artist & Teaching Appointments

  • 2024
  • Neighborhood Visiting Artist. Stanford University, Stanford, CA.
  • Instructor. “Textravaganza! A Social Practice & Print Exchange Crash Course.” Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, Deer Isle, ME.
  • 2022
  • Visiting Artist. California State University, Monterey Bay, CA.
  • 2021
  • Visiting Artist. University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI.
  • Visiting Artist. Ox-Bow School of Art & Artists’ Residency, Saugatuck, MI.
  • 2008-
  • Guest Artist. California College of the Arts (SF, CA), California Institute for Integral Studies (SF, CA), California State University—East Bay, Chautauqua School of Art (Chautauqua, NY), City University of New York—Graduate Center (NYC), LaGuardia Community College (NYC), Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath, (Bengaluru, India), Parsons/The New School (NYC), Portland State University (Portland, OR), The Oxbow School (Napa, CA), San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco State University, School of Visual Arts (NYC), Southern Oregon University (Ashland, OR), State University of New York at New Paltz, University of New Mexico at Albuquerque, University of San Francisco, University of California at Berkeley.

Residencies, Fellowships & Studio Programs

Grants, Awards & Honors

Professional Activities

Bibliography

Selected Publications

  • 2024
  • Conwell, Donna and Sicat, Kelly, eds. Hello Goodbye Hello. Saratoga, CA: Montalvo Arts Center. Contributor.
  • Thomas, Hank Willis; Gottesman, Eric; Woo, Michelle; Gallery, Wyatt; and brock, taylor; eds. For Freedoms: Where Do We Go From Here?. New York City: Monacelli. Contributor.
  • 2023
  • Mammana, Diana and von Oswald, Margareta, eds. The Resonant Museum: Berlin Conversations on Mental Health. Cologne: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther und Franz König. Contributor.
  • —. Process + Place: Headlands at 40. Sausalito, CA: Headlands Center for the Arts. Contributor.
  • 2022
  • Wise, Susie B. Design for Belonging. Stanford d.school/Ten Speed Press. “Host-hero of belonging.”
  • 2020
  • MacPhee, Josh, ed. Celebrate People’s History (2nd Edition). New York: Feminist Press. Contributor.
  • Levine, Cara, ed. This Is Not a Gun. Chicago: Candor Arts & Sming Sming Books. Contributor.
  • 2019
  • Christine Wong Yap and contributors, 100 Stories of Belonging in the S.F. Bay Area. Oakland: self-published as artist-in-residence at the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society at UC Berkeley. Editor, artist, designer, contributing writer.
  • 2018
  • Levine, Cara, ed. This Is Not a Gun Interjection Calendar. London: Montez Press. Contributor.
  • 2016
  • Hunn, Sarrita & James McAnally. To Make a Public: Temporary Art Review 2011–2016. Seattle, WA: INCA Press. Contributor.
  • Jobin-Leeds, Greg; Hernandez-Vazquez, Dey; Agitarte. When We Fight, We Win: Twenty-First-Century Social Movements and the Activists That Are Transforming Our World. New York: The New Press. Image.
  • Kennedy, Christopher Lee. “Let It Decay: Cultural Precarity in the Anthropocene.” Temporary Art Review. October 12. Animated data visualization/commission on the occassion of Common Field convening.
  • Petras, Kathryn and Ross. “Nothing Is Worth More Than This Day.” Workman Publishing. Quote.
  • 2015
  • Leong, Michael, ed. “Lines of Sight: Visual Art in Asian American Poetry.” The Margins. Asian American Writers Workshop. March 3. Art contribution.
  • Tang, Eric. “Unsettled: Cambodian Refugees in the New York City Hyperghetto.” Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Image.
  • 2014
  • —Gazette. Ortega y Gasset Projects, Ridgewood, NY. January. Drawing.
  • 2013
  • Davenport, Philip. The Dark Would. Manchester, UK: Apple Pie Editions. Art contribution.
  • —“Profile: Walden-Inspired Accounting.” Art Practical. Issue 4.11. March 12.
  • 2011
  • Guardiola, Pablo and Large, J. Brent, eds. SetToSignal.com. Essay: “Notes on Object-Viewer Relations.”
  • 2010
  • Cloutier, Julie, ed. City Reader. San Francisco: Reading Conventions, 2010. Art contribution.
  • Frock, Christian L. and Hanor, Stephanie. Here and Now. Oakland, CA: Mills College Art Museum / Invisible Venue. Catalog for commissioned public intervention series.
  • Tilton, Jennifer. Dangerous or Endangered: Race and the Politics of Youth in Urban America. New York: New York University Press, 2010. Cover art.
  • —, We have as much time as it takes. San Francisco: Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art. Exhibition catalog with interviews. [PDF]
  • 2009
  • Curreri, Amanda and Scollon, Erik, eds. Color&Color #0. New York / San Francisco, 2009. Image contributions.
  • —. Involved, Socially. San Francisco: Triple Base Gallery/Michelle Blade, 2009. Publication featuring contributions by members of 5-person exhibition, with essays by Matthew Rana.
  • Wazwaz, Maysoun, et. al.. Bellwether. San Francisco: Southern Exposure. Catalog for inaugural exhibition featuring 10 newly commissioned works, with "mirrorsblack" essay, 44-47.
  • 2008
  • —. Activist Imagination. San Francisco: Kearny Street Workshop, 2008. Exhibition catalog with essays by Kevin B. Chen and Samantha Chanse.
  • Sudbury, Julia, ed. Global Lockdown: Race, Gender and the Prison-Industrial Complex. New York: Routledge, 2005. Cover art (in collaboration with Lucha).
  • Wong Yap, Christine. Hyphen Magazine. Issue 7, Fall. Reproduction of a painting.
  • Wong, Christine. “Come on Down [Expect Stereotypes as South Asians Make U.S. Film, TV Debuts].” Oakland Tribune & KALW 91.7, Feb. 2. Public Radio Exchange piece profile.
  • Wong, Christine. “An ABC Comes Home: An Ancestral Pilgrimage to Guangdong, China.” Pacific News Service, Nov. 19. San Francisco Chronicle, 13 January.
  • Wong, Christine. “Forget Cinderella [Bride Laments Mother’s Gown].” Pacific News Service and KALW 91.7, April 3. Public Radio Exchange piece profile.

I am a visual artist and social practitioner who works in community engagement, drawing, printmaking, publishing, textiles, and public art. I conduct hyperlocal research projects to gather and amplify grassroots perspectives on belonging, resilience, and mental well-being.

Typically, I invite participants to engage in self-reflection, community building, art making, and creative place-knowing. Then, I use lettering, design, and other techniques to interpret these learnings into hand-crafted objects (e.g., flags, banners, letterpress prints, or jumbo jigsaw puzzles), publications (comic books, zines), or public artworks and activations (billboards, installations, parades).

My practice is informed by principles of popular education, accessibility, and growth mindset. This is rooted in formative experiences as a youth educator, the influence of printmakers like José Guadalupe Posada, and 10+ years of autodidactic study of positive psychology—the empirical study of human flourishing and subjective wellbeing. My interest in belonging deepened when I was the inaugural artist-in-residence at the Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley, where I collaboratively identified 15 qualities of belonging with Arts & Strategy Coordinator Evan Bissell. Recently, concurrent with my experiences as a caregiver, I’ve incorporated language justice and multiple languages in my projects.

Below are a few selected clips. For a complete, updated list, please see the bibliography of my C.V.

Hyperallergic

screenshot of webpage; see link for text

“Yap, who was previously an artist in residence at the University of California, Berkeley’s Othering & Belonging Institute, often focuses on mental health in her work. She believes making art with other immigrant women from different cultures and telling stories of resilience gave participants an opportunity to feel that they belong.

That was true for Manuela Esteva. In an interview, Esteva, speaking in Spanish, said the stairs in her flag represent people moving on and healing after trauma, and interlocking circles show their interdependence and reliance on each other. She had never sewn or made art before, but by the second workshop, she loved designing her flag.

‘My flag represents growth,’ Esteva said. ‘I never thought I could do this, but making it helped me get rid of my pain.’”

—Emily Wilson, “Immigrant Women Shine at SF’s Chinese New Year Parade,” Hyperallergic, February 6, 2023.

 

Time Magazine

screenshot of webpage; see link for text

“I’m also so thankful for the inspiration and solace I am finding in art and artists. I watched this beautiful animated meditation by Jess X Snow over and over again. I learned about this gorgeous poster series by Amanda Phingbodhipakkiya. I revisited Christine Wong Yap’s recent project in S.F. Chinatown and asked myself, How do I keep my heart open?”

–Ellen Oh, “Be Bold, Be Proud, Speak Up: Raising Asian American Daughters Now.” Time Magazine. March 21, 2021.

 

White Hot Magazine on Public Art & Philosophy

screenshot of webpage; see link for text

An essay that weaves together philosophical ideas from Hegel, Edward Casey, and Kongzi (Confucius), with billboards and a project on belonging in Chinatown.

“As daily life continues to be disrupted, we can begin to appreciate again the need for recognition that places afford. The art produced by Wong Yap and her collaborators, curated by Leung, reminds us of the role that art plays in the formation of place, our identity within it, and our need to recognize and communicate this belonging between us. Places are dynamic, as people are, full of tensions, contradictions, scenes of joy as well as despair. We are all touched by the places we belong and, by belonging to them, are able to become who we are. There, in the places we belong, we might come to recognize one another again.”

—Donovan Irven, “Disclosures: Christine Wong Yap and Hoi Leung or, The Places You Belong To,” Filo Sofi Arts Disclosures, White Hot Magazine of Contemporary Art, December 2020.

Sing Tao Daily on Hopes for Chinatown

screenshot of webpage; see link for text

“I wanted to do something to support the community as shelter in place took hold. It’s become more urgent for the project to provide counter-narratives to xenophobic hate, to encourage the public to patronize small businesses in Chinatown, and to give participants opportunities to connect with and celebrate meaningful aspects of their identities and personal histories. Social distancing, isolation, and othering actually underscores my role as an artist: to offer space for participants to connect (even if virtually, or by memory or imagination right now) with the people, places, and cultural assets that help them feel a sense of belonging in SF Chinatown.” —Christine Wong Yap

—. "藝術家創作支持華埠 葉黃嘉雯領銜" 星島日報, 2020年06月07日.

 

KQED Arts on Belonging (Bay Area)

screenshot of press page, see link for text

“Do you feel belonging in your local library, a neighborhood bar, a regular meeting in city hall? Or do you carry your sense of belonging with you from place to place?
“New York-based artist and Oakland expat Christine Wong Yap is making that often-intangible feeling visible—by identifying, commemorating and sharing others’ sites of belonging—based on a survey of nearly 100 participants in the nine-county Bay Area region.
“Belonging happens when people feel safe, seen and accepted, Wong Yap says. Her questionnaire, issued over a five-week period at the end of 2018, asked participants identify a place where they think to themselves either ‘This is my community,’ ‘These are my people,‘ or ‘I can be me here.’”

Hotchkiss, Sarah. “Christine Wong Yap Asks: Where Do You Feel a Sense of Belonging?” KQED Arts, February 24, 2019.

 

Since my favorite way to learn about art is to hear artists speak about their work, here are selected videos and recordings of online conversations.

Deep Dive Into Design: How Might We (Re)Design Spaces for Belonging?

still of video with four panes of guest speakers doing a group remote call from home

In November 2024, I discussed the intersection of design and belonging with artist Brooke Toczylowski, and author-designers David Jay (author of Relationality) and Dr. Susie Wise (author of Design for Belonging) in a conversation hosted by Nico Chen of the Mechanic’s Institute.

How do we build bridges? | P L A C E: Reckonings by Asian American Artists Closing Symposium | Montalvo Arts Center

still of video with four panelists on a stage in a theater, with the text on a slide, depth of engagement vs breadth of participation

In August 2024, I organized and moderated a panel featuring Brett Cook, interdisciplinary artist and educator; Beatrice Glow, multidisciplinary artist; and Michelle Lin, ARTogether Artist Growth Program Director, textile artist, and author. Each shared projects illustrating how they built cross-cultural bridges, transcended borders, practiced allyship/accompliceship, or designed immersive experiences to explore complex social relationships.

Mindscapes: Art, Mental Health, and Forms of Healing | Conversations | Art Basel Hong Kong

still of video with female panelists on stage at Art Basel Hong Kong

In March 2023, I discussed mental wellbeing on a panel with other artists-in-residence with Mindscapes—Wellcome Trust’s international programme—and Cynthia Tongson, sister of Hong Kong painter Wesley Tongson.

Abundance, Connection, and Generosity | Artist Interview | Avant Arte

Video still of the artist working at a leterpress

In fall 2021, I introduced to my practice and a limited-edition artwork inspired by a dear friend in a collaboration between Avant Arte and For Freedoms. Filmed in the printshop at Kala Art Institute, Berkeley, CA.

Belonging at the LA Public Library

clip from video of artist working in studio

A short clip from a longer video about my project as an artist-in-residence with the Library Foundation of LA and the LAPL commemorating clubs or affinity groups, with behind-the-scenes footage of making banners in my studio. On view in the Something in Common exhibition at the LAPL Central Branch through November 6, 2022.

Creative Attention: Artist Interview

still from video of artist speaking in front of a map of palo alto and east palo alto painted on the wall

Overview of my project as an artist-in-residence at the Palo Alto Art Center. I worked with teens in Palo Alto and East Palo Alto to develop calligraphy, portraits, and a collective map of belonging.


Virtual Armory Live | Public Art: The Way Forward

screenshot of a slide show with a billboard design featuring 3 medical workers

Jean Cooney, Director, Times Square Arts; Michelle Woo, Director, For Freedoms; and Artists Christine Wong Yap and Nekisha Durrett discuss their current project Messages for the City and the role of public art in light of the 2020 pandemic and in response to the current protests against racial injustice. Moderated by Nicole Berry, Executive Director, The Armory Show.


Conversations on Care: A Panel Discussion

screenshot of installation art

Curator Shannon R. Stratton leads a round-robin discussion with the artists participating in Between You and Me, an exhibition at the John Michael Kohler Art Center. Artists: Chloë Bass, Sara Clugage, General Sisters (Dana Bishop-Root and Ginger Brooks Takahashi), Lisa Jarrett and Harrell Fletcher (Harriet Tubman Center for Expanded Curatorial Practice), John Preus, Benjamin Todd Wills, and Christine Wong Yap.


Unfinished Live: Democracy & Voice

still of video chat featuring two asian american men, eric liu and yo-yo ma

[I do not appear in this video, but my art does. I couldn’t be more honored to have my work be a spark in this conversation.]

Eric Liu asks Yo-Yo Ma to respond to the question in my billboard, “How do you keep your heart open?” Part of 2020 Awakening, a collaboration between Unfinished and For Freedoms.

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