Included are artists from China, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, Samoa, and Hawaii. Their ages range from their late 20s through their 80s and their works include traditional crafts to postmodern installations.
Several themes pervade the exhibition as a whole.
Viewers and readers interested in such topics as traditional representations of Asian American women, the relationships of art and autobiography, and the tradition of visionary art will find considerable satisfaction. This active audience involvement is a valuable antidote to the conventional critical mystification that fosters audience diffidence and increases dependence on established authorities in the academy and elite media. Several features of the exhibition and catalogue can and should be read politically on both subtle and overt levels. Above all, the very presentation of women's art is a resistance statement against male hegemony in the visual arts. During most of this century, major art history textbooks have, at best, presented a few women artists in passing, often employing patronizing language that marginalizes women's creative contributions.