Waves of Identity: 35 Years of Archiving

Museum of Chinese in America

Pure+Applied designed the graphics, and participated in extensive brainstorming conversations about object-display, for this MoCA exhibition that used the language of archiving, storage, and labeling. The exhibition presented more than 200 objects and stories, organized in eight sections around a series of provocative questions including, “Where Does Chinatown End?”; “How Do You Become American?”; and “What Does It Mean To Be Chinese?” The questions were posted on the sides of archival boxes, which sat atop the storage racks that formed the exhibition’s “display cases.” The inquiry-based approach prompted visitors to actively search for answers within the museum’s materials and objects. The featured artifacts, documents, videos, and oral histories embodied and evoked the lives, complexities, and aspirations of Chinese American communities in New York’s Chinatown and beyond.

Curator: Herb Tam

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