Winged Seeds

“three sisters” and “lanternfly” by Jia Sung

May 20 - September 2025

Opening Reception: Tuesday May 20th, 6-8PM

Think!Chinatown’s Studio - 1 Pike Street, New York, NY 10002 

Winged Seeds is an upcoming Think!Chinatown exhibition featuring artwork by Jia Sung. Opening in May 2025, Winged Seeds will explore the artist’s interests in diasporic narratives, family archive, and interspecies kinship, to uplift and reframe the ancestral stories of Manhattan’s Chinatown.

 

Exhibit-Related Programs

Featured
Winged Seeds: Ancestral Stories + Craft Night
Apr 12
Winged Seeds: Ancestral Stories + Craft Night

Join artist Jia Sung for an afternoon of crafting and sharing at Think!Chinatown's Studio. Together we’ll explore basic embroidery techniques, look at some examples from history as well as Jia’s own work, and learn about its storytelling history and decorative uses. During the craft circle portion of the workshop, participants are invited to bring their favorite photos from their family archives, and share about the stories behind them. Embroidery sampler squares will contribute to the collaborative portraits for Think!Chinatown’s upcoming exhibition with Jia Sung, Winged Seeds. — Free with RSVP required, registration details TBA!

Winged Seeds: Embroidery Evening
Apr 16
Winged Seeds: Embroidery Evening

Explore basic embroidery techniques with artist Jia Sung, look at some examples from history as well as artist Jia’s own work, and learn about its storytelling history and its decorative uses. Participants will get to apply their new needlework vocabulary to various plant and insect motifs drawn from North American invasive species, designed by Jia. These embroidery sampler squares will contribute to the collaborative portraits for Think!Chinatown’s upcoming exhibition with Jia Sung, Winged Seeds. — Free with RSVP required, registration details TBA!

Winged Seeds: Embroidery Evening
Apr 23
Winged Seeds: Embroidery Evening

Explore basic embroidery techniques with artist Jia Sung, look at some examples from history as well as artist Jia’s own work, and learn about its storytelling history and its decorative uses. Participants will get to apply their new needlework vocabulary to various plant and insect motifs drawn from North American invasive species, designed by Jia. These embroidery sampler squares will contribute to the collaborative portraits for Think!Chinatown’s upcoming exhibition with Jia Sung, Winged Seeds. — Free with RSVP required, registration details TBA!

 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Jia Sung (b. 1992, Minneapolis, MN) is a Singaporean Chinese artist and educator whose practice spans painting, artist books, textiles, printmaking, writing, and translation. Drawing on motifs from Chinese mythology and Buddhist iconography, Sung uses the familiar visual language of folklore to examine and subvert conventional archetypes of femininity, queerness, and otherness. Her work has been exhibited at institutions such as Wave Hill, the Hessel Museum, and EFA Project Space, has appeared in publications including The Paris Review, The New Yorker, and the Poetry Foundation, and is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, SFMOMA, and the Special Collections at Yale, RISD, and SAIC. She is the author of Trickster’s Journey, a Chinese mythological tarot deck and guidebook, published with Running Press in 2023, and has taught with organizations like the Metropolitan Museum, MoMA, NYU, and RISD. @jiazilla / jia-sung.com

Think!Chinatown is a place-based intergenerational non-profit in Manhattan’s Chinatown, working at the intersection of storytelling, arts and neighborhood engagement. We believe the process of listening, reflecting and celebrating develops the community cohesion and trust necessary to work on larger neighborhood issues. By building strength from within our neighborhood, we can shape better policies and programs that define our public spaces, celebrate our cultural heritage and innovate how our collective memories are represented.