Art Exhibit: Measurement of Wellbeing by Yaning Xing

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Join us for an art exhibit by MFA candidate Yaning Xing on Measurement of Wellbeing in Herter Art Gallery, May 9-24, with opening reception on May 9 at 4 p.m.

Xing is an MFA candidate in the UMass Amherst Department of Art who works across the mediums of painting, drawing, and installation. Born in China's Shiyan, Hubei—formerly a booming, factory town—her work offers a window in to the lives of those conscripted by Chinese capitalist modernity—communities like her own whose ways of life have been forever changed by the relentless logic of capitalist restructuring. 

Her art aims to break free of the stereotyped ethnographies of abjection, however, and instead to combine an attention to personal detail with a critical examination of larger social structures, striving to shed light on the creative, resilient ways that such people navigate their changing circumstances and fortunes—on both their hardships and their hopes. She hopes, moreover, to offer a window into the unseen and undervalued labor performed by women within such communities.