Yuen Fong Ling: A Changing Appetite

Join us for a talk with artist and curator Yuen Fong Ling, who will reflect on a period of creativity, hybridity, and possibility centred around Manchester, when artists of ESEA heritage were building connections across a widely dispersed and often fragmented artistic community.

The event will begin with a talk by Ling as he reflects on personal inspirations and motivations, the changing appetite for Chinese art, and more broadly on how these histories are being held today. A moment of rumination, Ling will talk about his early involvement with the Chinese Arts Centre, where he volunteered and later worked as Exhibition Curator through the Woo Arts Traineeship in partnership with North West Arts Board and Cornerhouse, before becoming Curator and later Co-Director at Castlefield Gallery. This will be followed by a Q&A session, offering the audience the opportunity to engage with the artist and curator directly.

Drawing on his own artistic and curatorial practice, Ling revisits the networks, collaborations, and critical friendships that developed through artist-led exhibitions, research projects, and strategic initiatives during the 1990s and early 2000s. Through selected exhibitions and projects – including New Generations (1996), How the West Was Won (1999), FLIP (2000), Dog and Partridge (2003), and Arrivals and Departures (2007) – Ling will explore how his artistic and professional identity developed during this time, and how artists navigated the politics of race, gender, sexuality, and class while challenging perceptions of Chinese art and artists in the UK.

Revisiting these histories today, the talk considers how artists and curators might reappraise their work alongside peers and collaborators, examining how these experiences might help reframe art histories and reclaim representation for future generations.

Advance booking is required to attend this event.

About Yuen Fong Ling

Yuen Fong Ling (b. 1972, Salford) is an artist and curator based at Yorkshire Art Space, Sheffield. He completed an MFA at Glasgow School of Art and a PhD by Practice at the University of Lincoln, with a thesis titled A Body of Relations: Reconfiguring the Life Class.

Recent exhibitions include We Are the Monument at Graves Gallery, Sheffield (2025–26), commissioned by UAL’s Decolonising Art Institute 20/20 Project, and Towards Memorial at Bury Art Museum (2021–22), supported by the Platform Artist Programme at Site Gallery.

Ling has recently been awarded the Collections in Dialogue commission with Leeds Art Gallery, the Henry Moore Foundation, and The British Library, for exhibition in 2027. He is also a resident artist/researcher in the University of Salford’s Art Collection, in partnership with Castlefield Gallery and Salford Museum and Art Gallery.

About esea contemporary

esea contemporary is the UK’s only non-profit art centre specialising in presenting and platforming artists and art practices that identify with and are informed by East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) cultural backgrounds.

esea contemporary is situated in an award-winning building in the heart of Manchester, home to one of the largest East Asian populations in the UK. Since its inauguration as a community-oriented visual arts festival in 1986, esea contemporary has continuously evolved to establish itself as a dynamic and engaging space for cross-cultural exchanges in the British art scene, as well as in a global context.

esea contemporary aims to increase the visibility of contemporary art practices from the East and Southeast Asian communities and their diasporas. It is a site for forward-thinking art programmes that beyond exhibitions also include commissions, research, residencies, publishing, and a wide range of vibrant public events. esea contemporary values creativity, compassion, interconnectedness, and collectivity in implementing its mission.

Learn more at: www.eseacontemporary.org

Photo by Joe Smith.

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