Kristiana Chan 莊礼恩

Kristiana Chan 莊礼恩 is a multimedia visual artist from the American South based in the Bay Area. Her work examines the material memory of the landscape and the excluded histories of the Asian American diaspora. She researches the political, historical, and environmental heritage of the landscape and its material elements and organisms, and  incorporates their properties into her processes. She is interested in the relationships of themes of migration, labor, trade, and reciprocity with the natural world, challenging ideals of extractive capitalism and grounding her objects in material tactility to explore our future relationships with land, history, and resources. 

Her previous projects have focused on the lost stories of early Chinese diaspora settlers in California, and their connections to industries like fishing and mining. These stories, images, and references entangle the historical and mythological, while the gathered materials attempt to transcend gaps in the written record. Chan is interested in themes of science and speculative fiction, and the littoral coastal zones, gleaning ancient wisdom from environments that have adapted to rapidly changing conditions. 

She is a recipient of the Rydell Visual Arts Fellowship and has held residencies at Anderson Ranch Arts Center, ACRE, Tides Institute of Art and History, and Stelo Arts. She has shown at the Asian Art Museum, Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History, University of San Francisco, Stelo Arts, SOMArts, Vessel Gallery, Kearny Street Workshop, and the David Brower Center. Kristiana is currently an MFA candidate at the University of California, Berkeley. 

Programs:

• Marcus Exhibition When the World is Beautifully Strange (2025)