About

Throughout generations, traditions and memories in Asian cultures have been passed down through ceremonial offerings known as Jesa (제사 in Korean) or Jisi (祭祀 in Chinese). These rituals honor the deceased and sustain a spiritual connection with generations past, expressed through offerings of food and flowers. Such tributes are more than acts of nourishment—they are gestures of comfort, reverence, and an enduring bond with nature. In both Korean and Chinese cultures, fruits and flowers symbolize abundance and good fortune, reminders of heritage and tradition.

In this installation, ceramic objects are reimagined through symbolic patterns and thoughtful arrangements, expressing a sense of displacement and the search for belonging. Created by two Asian artists living in Texas, these works are drawn from their shared experiences as drifters, distanced from their ancestral homelands.

We invite viewers to contemplate the layered complexities of identity and belonging, and to reflect on their own immigrant or diasporic experiences. By evoking these hopefully familiar memories, we hope to offer a sense of peace, kinship, and collective reflection.

Sun-Jue Shin X Allen Zewen Yu

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E-mail: diasporaoffering@gmail.com

Display 1: One Becomes Many

Pomegranates have long symbolized abundance—and here, they embody unity and the quiet strength found in togetherness. A seemingly precarious stack of fruits, delicately balanced yet still support each other to bloom and flourish, mirrors the familial bonds in many Asian households: fragile at times, but ultimately supportive and life-giving.

This sculptural arrangement draws deeply from the ceremonial traditions of Jesa (제사) and Jisi (祭祀), ancestral rites that honor lineage and spiritual continuity. Through this offering, we express a longing for solidarity among immigrants and descendants of immigrants, and a collective reverence for the cultural inheritance that binds us all.

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Display 2: Nature and the Impermanence of Life

At the heart of the arrangement are the moon jars, a form revered in Korean tradition for its gentle curves and quiet strength. Traditionally associated with purity, humility, and wholeness, the moon jar carries with it centuries of cultural significance. Yet here, it is reimagined through a diasporic lens. Our moon jars are more playful and expressive, their forms and colors more vibrant and unexpected. The saekdong color stripes reference a time when this colorful pattern was used on children’s hambok to bring good luck. This reinterpretation reflects the evolving identities we shape in new lands—hybrid, layered, and alive with color.

Paired with an abundance of intricately crafted ceramic flowers, this installation becomes a meditation on impermanence and resilience. Flowers remind us of life’s beauty and its transience. Their fleeting nature, blooming brilliantly for a moment before withering, mirrors the ephemerality of memory, belonging, and the immigrant experience itself. The fragility of the materials echoes the vulnerability of our own journeys, while the care and intention in their making speak to the quiet strength passed down through generations. In this piece, we honor both the traditional and the transformed—what we inherit, and what we recreate in the face of change.

Display 3: To a Hopeful Future

This final arrangement offers a tribute to Asian culture through a lush offering of fruit. Both of us hold childhood memories of fruit gifted by loved ones—symbols of care, connection, and love. In many Asian traditions, fruits presented to ancestors are offerings of gratitude and hope. In the face of hardship, they speak to resilience and a collective wish for well-being and a flourishing future. These offerings connect us to those who came before and to the evolving cultural identities they helped shape.

This display serves as a love letter to our families, our communities, and the cultural legacies that continue to shape us. It is a reminder that through acts of offering, we stay connected: across distance, across time, and across generations.