{"id":102886,"date":"2026-05-08T10:12:48","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T17:12:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=102886"},"modified":"2026-05-11T10:13:20","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T17:13:20","slug":"mimi-chen-ting-makes-movement-visible-at-byu-moa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/mimi-chen-ting-makes-movement-visible-at-byu-moa\/","title":{"rendered":"Mimi Chen Ting Makes Movement Visible at BYU MOA"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Installation view of “Make Movement Visible” at the BYU Museum of Art. Image by Gina Cavallo.<\/p><\/div>\n

Mimi Chen Ting believed movement could be made visible. In paintings filled with looping lines, rhythmic geometries, and figures that seem to pulse across the canvas, the artist transformed dance, migration, memory, and music into visual form. In a downstairs gallery at the BYU Museum of Art, Make Movement Visible<\/em> introduces many Utah audiences to the late Chinese American painter whose work bridged performance and painting over decades of artistic practice.<\/h4>\n

The late artist\u2019s family worked with BYU MOA\u2019s curator, Miri Kim, to bring these masterful paintings to the museum. Born in Shanghai and raised in Hong Kong, Ting left Hong Kong in 1965 for San Francisco at the age of 18. She came to the U.S. on an F-1 nonimmigrant student visa, enrolling at San Francisco College for Women and then San Jose State University. She came just as the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 abolished discriminatory quotas that had historically targeted Chinese immigrants. \u201cI found a connection to her in this,\u201d shares Miri Kim. \u201cMy parents came here on the same type of student visa.\u201d The curator further notes in one didactic panel, \u201cAs a Chinese American artist, Ting understood that movement (in all senses of the word) was never neutral. Themes of migration, diaspora, memory, intergenerational relations, creative community, and hard-won solitude came to define her art.\u201d<\/h4>\n

Ting\u2019s big, boldly colored blends of figure and form are more than just visually appealing. The title of the exhibition\u2014”Make Movement Visible”\u2014reflects the \u201cguiding imperative\u201d and goals of all the artist\u2019s work and it creates a gallery filled with undeniably vibrant movement. It references all types of movement\u2014the artist\u2019s hand in the painting process, social movements, visual and compositional movement, musical movements, dance, and performance. \u201cThe title comes from a quote from Mimi Chen Ting from 1977,\u201d states Kim. The artist\u2019s quote leads the introductory panel: “Make movement visible and harness it within casings called lines, thereby forming shapes.”<\/h4>\n