Chinatown Revisited

Philadelphia's Chinatown began with a single Chinese-American laundry in the 1860s and has grown into a thriving residential neighborhood and a major cultural and business district. 'Chinatown In/Flux,' an ambitious project of site-specific public art now on view throughout Chinatown, was organized by the Asian Arts Initiative to explore the transitions that are still taking place in this diverse community. Gayle Isa, executive director of AAI, explained that the organizers chose seven artists with very different backgrounds and sensibilities to offer a variety of perspectives on the Chinatown community, as well as to 'jar stereotypes.' Planning for the project started three years ago and all of the artists made visits to Chinatown to meet with people from the community.
JiHyun Park, a New York-based installation artist who immigrated to the U.S. from Korea in 1999, also addresses local commerce in Chicken Broccoli. As a tribute to the American-invented Chinese restaurant staple, Park constructed 20 hand-painted cast resin fake bonsai trees with tiny dioramas of broccoli and chickens and installed them in a storefront filled with decorative ceramics. Skowman Hastanan's piece, Tell me a Story, in the window of the Serendipity Caf�, doesn't directly comment on the commercial operation, but rather on the past and present of all of the people who enter and pass by. Her decorative bead curtain was made from strings of jewellike clear acrylic beads containing prints of old photos and quotes from AAI's oral history project in three languages. Hastanan was born and raised in Thailand, but has lived in New York since 1973.

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