The Weisman presents a career survey by Tiffany Chung, an artist mapping the entanglements and erasures of global events

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The Weisman presents a career survey by Tiffany Chung, an artist mapping the entanglements and erasures of global events

September 1, 2026

A floating city is installed in a gallery space

The Weisman is pleased to announce the upcoming opening of Tiffany Chung: indelible traces—on view from September 19 - December 6, 2026—a traveling exhibition organized by the Art, Design & Architecture Museum at UC Santa Barbara and curated by Orianna Cacchione.

Vietnamese American artist Tiffany Chung pointedly reveals histories that have too often been overlooked or intentionally ignored. She is attuned to the ways that knowledge replicates power, erasing as much as it records. Seeking to fill in the gaps left out of official reports, she draws on the Japanese concept of ma, the emptiness or space between things, to challenge historical narratives written by those who hold power or influence. She incorporates statistical data, extensive archival research, and documentation with people’s lived experiences to reconstruct more complete stories of historical events and to create new systems of representation that include what has been left out and what remains unknowable.

A map is shown against a yellow background, with red bullseyes marking key areas — Tiffany Chung, ISW: areas of control; UNHCR: numbers and locations of Syrian refugees and IDPs as of April 2019, 2019. Acrylic, ink, and oil on vellum and paper, 76 x 93 cm (30 ¼ x 39 ½ in.). Photograph by Nash Baker. © Tiffany Chung

Chung investigates landscapes and migratory networks marked by climate change and wars, colonialism and nation building, post-industrialization and urbanization by tracing the relationships between living beings, the built environment, nature, and forces of power. She mines the histories of single sites to reveal systems of power and cycles of transformation—natural or human-made, resilient or destructive—across stretches of geological time. Conversely, she traces the complex interconnections of people, animals, cultures, flora, and fauna as they move around the world. Together, her projects unravel the often-hidden entanglements of history, politics, economics, and ecology that accrue in landscapes, shape networks, and spark conflicts.

This exhibition, the first comprehensive survey of Tiffany Chung’s career, showcases the intricately drawn or embroidered maps that she is best known for alongside her sculptures, videos, performances, and installations. Bringing together traces, fragments, and voices that have been silenced, her art questions not only how history is told but also who tells that history, who belongs within it, and who and what are excluded. Ultimately, Chung utilizes this reckoning with history to powerfully inform our future actions.

A map of the world, with the global spice trade routes represented by stitching — Tiffany Chung, *Global Spice Trade: routes from ancient times to the age of exploration/exploitation*, 2024–2025. Embroidery on fabric, 140 x 380 cm (55 x 149 ½ in.). Courtesy of the artist, Kiang Malingue Gallery, Hong Kong | New York, Max Estrella Galería, Madrid, and RYAN LEE Gallery, New York. Image by Andrea Rossetti. © Tiffany Chung.

Opening day activities on Saturday, September 19, 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. include one-stop guided tours in the galleries and art-making in the Open Studio, inspired by Chung’s research-driven art practice.

On Wednesday, October 28, the artist and exhibition curator Orianna Cacchione will be at the Weisman for a public conversation about Chung's interdisciplinary practice and how cartography, archival research, and storytelling reveal the lasting impacts of war, displacement, environmental change, migration, and global trade, while considering the role of contemporary art in engaging these complex histories.

Admission to the exhibition and related programs is free and open to everyone.

Tiffany Chung: indelible traces is organized by the Art, Design & Architecture Museum at UC Santa Barbara and is curated by Orianna Cacchione. The exhibition is made possible thanks to the generous support of the Terra Foundation for American Art and the Henry Luce Foundation. Additional support provided by UCSB’s Art Equity Commons, the Billy Rose Foundation, and the AD&A Museum Council. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a Minnesota State Arts Board Operating Support grant, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund. Additional general operating support is generously provided by Ameriprise Financial.

Image credit (top): Tiffany Chung, stored in a jar: monsoon, drowning fish, color of water, and the floating world, 2010–2011. Mixed media, dimension of installation: approx. 6 x 3.6 m (20 x 12 ft.). Post Vidai Collection. Installation view, Breath(e): Toward Climate and Social Justice, Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, September 14, 2024–January 5, 2025. Photo: Jeff McLane. © Tiffany Chung.

About the Artist

Tiffany Chung

Tiffany Chung (born 1969, Đà Nẵng, Việt Nam; lives in Houston, Texas) is an interdisciplinary artist globally recognized for her research-driven practice exploring the intersections of history, culture, and geography on both local and global scales. Working across diverse media—including cartography, embroidery, painting, photography, sculpture, video, text, and music—her projects trace shifts in cultural, geopolitical, and natural landscapes shaped by the upheavals of war, displacement, disaster, and global trade. Chung earned a BFA in Photography at California State University, Long Beach (1998), and an MFA at the University of California, Santa Barbara (2000). She is currently an inaugural KAVAH Fermata Fellow at the University of Chicago. Previously, she was a Mellon Arts & Practitioner Fellow at the Yale Center for the Study of Race, Indigeneity, and Transnational Migration (RITM) (2021) and served as Jane Lombard Fellow for Art & Social Justice at the Vera List Center, New School (2018–20).

Chung has exhibited her artwork widely in the United States and abroad. Recent solo exhibitions include Vietnam, Past Is Prologue at the Smithsonian American Art Museum (2019) and Rise Into the Atmosphere at the Dallas Museum of Art (2023–25), as well as presentations at Lumiar Cité/Maumaus, Lisbon, Portugal (2019); Johann Jacobs Museum, Zürich, Switzerland (2018); Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen, Denmark (2016); Kenpoku Art at the Hitachi City Museum, Ibaraki, Japan (2016); and Lieu-Commun, Toulouse, France (2014). Her work has been featured in major exhibitions and biennials throughout the world. Exhibitions include, most recently, Breath(e): Toward Climate and Social Justice, at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, as part of PST Art (2024–25); Are you Ready? Surge to 2030: Enhancing Ambition in Asia-Pacific to Accelerate Disaster Risk Reduction, UNDRR Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (2024); After Rain: Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale (2024); For the Living, part of Beyond Granite: Pulling Together at the National Mall in Washington, DC (2023). Biennials include the 56th Venice Biennale, Sharjah Biennial, Biennale of Sydney, Gwangju Biennale, Bienal de Cuenca (Ecuador), EVA International (Ireland). Her work has also been presented at the Museum of Modern Art (New York), the British Museum (London), Schirn Kunsthalle (Frankfurt, Germany), the Nobel Peace Center (Oslo, Norway), Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (Humlebæk, Denmark), Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona, M+ museum (Hong Kong), 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art Kanazawa (Japan), and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (San Francisco), among others. Chung has received the Asia Arts Game Changer Award (2020), the Asian Cultural Council Grant (2015), and Sharjah Biennial Artist Prize for Exceptional Contribution (2013).