Hung Hsien: Between Worlds is the first major retrospective of the pioneering modern ink artist Hung Hsien (洪嫻, Margaret Chang, b. 1933). Surveying a career that spans more than 70 years, this landmark exhibition celebrates the life and artistic legacy of one of the most important yet underrepresented contributors to the development of modern ink painting.

The ninety-one-year-old Hung Hsien has spent her career navigating multiple artistic and cultural worlds. Born in Yangzhou, China, in 1933, she moved with her family to Taiwan in 1948, where she studied under Prince Pu Ru, a revered scholar-painter and guardian of Qing dynasty court painting traditions. She continued her studies at National Taiwan Normal University before relocating to the United States in 1958, where she engaged deeply with Abstract Expressionism, Surrealism, and other modernist movements while studying at Northwestern University and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Living in the U.S., in the mid-1960s, Hung Hsien invented a modern ink painting language entirely her own. She became one of only a few women to exhibit with Taiwan’s avant-garde Fifth Moon Group, a collective dedicated to modernizing ink painting by synthesizing Eastern and Western approaches. Inspired by artists such as Mark Tobey, Arshile Gorky, and Willem de Kooning, as well as Japanese woodblock prints, Hung developed a distinct artistic language that fused lyrical brushstrokes, abstract forms, and bold color blocks—an approach that continues to resonate with contemporary artists today.

Despite her profound contributions to global modernism, Hung remains largely underrecognized in mainstream art historical narratives. Drawn primarily from private collections and the artist’s personal archives, Between Worlds seeks to highlight Hung Hsien’s pivotal yet often overlooked role in modern ink painting, offering a long-overdue reexamination of her enduring legacy.

More information available at Asia Society Texas.