A world map made of thick black lines spans a vast oval on the ground. Dozens of stakes suggest specific locations across the globe, though no countries are marked. A spray of orange, yellow, and blue cords radiates from each stake.

Tiffany Chung

For the Living (2023)

A sprawling map of the world that traces the global routes of Southeast Asian immigrants and refugees from the Vietnam War, adjacent to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Tiffany Chung’s For the Living is a monumental world map based on routes of exile, including those taken by the Southeast Asian diaspora as a result of the Vietnam War. Chung explores this narrative of immigrant and refugee movement by inviting viewers to reimagine how these pathways contribute to the story of US geography and belonging. Each line on the map, conveyed through a color-coded calibrated rope, corresponds to routes by boat (blue), land (orange), and air (yellow). Placed in proximity to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Chung’s work uses, as she notes, “the Vietnamese experience as an anchor point and reminder of America being a second chance that many people have risked their lives for.”

Location: Constitution Gardens–West (map)

Materials: Mixed-media earthwork

Photos courtesy of Steve Weinik Photography

Photos courtesy of AJ Mitchell Photography

A Vietnamese woman stands regally in front of a cityscape flecked with the light browns of drying plants. She wears a navy blouse closed with a brown button with a small v at the neckline. A small smile plays on her lips.

Tiffany Chung

Born 1969 in Da Nang, Vietnam
Based in Houston, Texas
she/her/hers

Tiffany Chung is a Vietnamese American visual artist known for her map-based drawings, embroideries, paintings, sculptures, photographs, and videos that examine conflict, geopolitical partitioning, spatial transformation, environmental crisis, and forced migration in relation to history and cultural memory. Her work has been presented in a solo exhibition at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and at biennials and museums worldwide, including the 56th Venice Biennale, the Museum of Modern Art, the British Museum, and the Nobel Peace Center. Chung’s solo show Rise into the Atmosphere is on view at the Dallas Museum of Art through August 2025.

Credits

Project manager: Matthew Seamus Callinan

Fabricators: UAP and RZ-1 Fine Art Solutions

Special thank-yous: Betsy Jacobson, Margaret Hewitt, Mike Price, Rachel Schmidt, Christopher Testa, Brian Barr, Maggie Tsang, Gebby Keny, and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Archive, Geneva

Public Conversation and Mapping Workshop / Public Program of Tiffany Chung’s For the Living

Took place Saturday, September 9, 2023
Constitution Gardens - West

A public dialogue on the National Mall with leaders and organizers focusing on the interconnected stories of diverse diasporic refugee and immigrant communities, alongside a mapping workshop to trace participants’ own roots and routes.

Featured guest speakers included:

  • Arash Azizzada – Afghans For A Better Tomorrow (AFBT)

  • Meena Javid – Cultural Organizer and Volunteer on behalf of Afghan refugee family resettlement

  • Helal Massomi – Afghan Policy Advisor for Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services

  • Lee Pao Xiong – Founding Director of the Center for Hmong Studies and Professor of Hmong Studies and American Government/Political Science at Concordia University

  • Valerie Plesch – Independent first-generation American-Vietnamese-Argentine photojournalist, documentary photographer, and writer

  • Maryam Yousufi, Journalist and former Voice of America (VOA) in Afghanistan

Public Program