Eating Bitterness 

2017
Performance and installation 
8 hours a day for 5 days

In this relational performance staged in an empty retail store in Manhattan Chinatown, the artist first cooked and served bitter melon to his family of six before inviting the public to sit down and eat the bitter meal together. Some participants welcomed the bitterness as an old friend; for others it was unpalatable. For Chinese Americans, the bitter melon acted as a shibboleth as well as a vector for nostalgia. A prominent white art historian walked past the performance without pause and then turned around asking if he could take the food to go.