Asian American Resource Center Exhibits

The AARC’s Community Art Exhibit Program displays artworks year round that celebrate the diverse and dynamic cultural heritage, history, identity and creativity of Asian American Pacific Islanders. Exhibits are displayed on a quarterly schedule.

Upcoming Exhibits and Programs

Join us for the Exhibit Reception Tuesday, October 27 from 6 to 8pm. Learn more and RSVP for the Fall Exhibit Reception.

Koi Ponds | On-View October 27, 2026 through February 6, 2027

Picture of Lauren Hua sitting in front of paintings from Koi Pond, smiling at the camera

Lauren Hua’s solo exhibition, Koi Ponds, features a series of free-flowing meditative studies of energy and natural elements inspired by the practice and cultivation of Koi fish. Hua’s paintings interlace Japanese, Chinese, and American stylistic influences in the media, techniques, and materials used. This collection of work honors Hua’s Asian American upbringing, identity, and family history, while also highlighting her personal commitment to and journey in pursuing the arts, despite being taught that these things are of little value. Koi Ponds is Hua’s personal dedication to embracing what it means to Asian American.

Artist Bio / Statement

Lauren Hua is an abstract expressionist painter based in Austin, TX. She uses acrylic paint, modeling paste, and gold leaf, along with other media, to make work that communicates her journey of self-discovery and acceptance in pursuing art and beauty, while processing her Asian American heritage and identity. Hua’s mark-making and composition setting is inspired by Japanese and Chinese stylistic influences, with visible brushstrokes, structured calligraphy lines, and translucent washes of paint. Hua’s application of bold metallic accents and substantial textures is inspired by facets of western influence and is used as a point of visual deviation from the traditional mark-making and applications of color. In each of her paintings, Hua’s practice melds these influences and materials together in an accumulation of layers, which distinctively highlight the depth of water, the energy of currents, and the passage of time.

Frottage: Meaning and Remembering | On-View October 27, 2026 through February 6, 2027

Picture of Gabrielle Clemente sitting in front of a piece from Frottage, smiling at the calendar

Cicada shells, old medical textbooks, my dad's 1998 "Thanksgiving dinner menu" from Fort Hood. Pieces of personal history fuel my art, things that came before me, and the things that will come after. I give the disregarded a place on my wall or inside my desk drawer. Absence creates a desire for excess; I still find myself as an adult asking about my dad's life before he came to the States and wonder what caused my mom to fear for stability and routine so much that she joined the military. I keep my grandmother's copy of Gray's Anatomy on my bedside table, preserving her through drawings of bone marrow, muscle cells, and the thymus. I, almost desperately, make physical spaces for memories and history, before they're lost to insignificance.

My work can be primarily described as archival. Through my practice, I am documenting personal history and my family's lived experiences. Flattening years of documentation and conversations into one drawing, a photograph. I aim to create an experience with my work that breaks down a traditional gallery space, an environment entrenched in academia and largely inaccessible to many. My work is not intended to be read as a series of paintings on a wall. My body of work is a space; a memory preserved in a room.

Artist Bio / Statement

Gabrielle Clemente (Gabi Clementine) is a multimedia artist born in Hanau, Germany, and based in Austin, Texas. Their work displays interpersonal relationships and individuals' roles within their environment through archival preservation and documentation. Clemente explores femininity, gender outside a Western perspective, immigration and citizenship, and the political atmosphere of the Philippines through mixed media and found objects. Clemente graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a BFA in Studio Art with a track in transmedia, printmaking, and painting and drawing.

Interested in exhibiting at the AARC or leading a creative workshop?

Community Exhibits Program: Our Community Exhibits Program rotates exhibits on a seasonal basis. Exhibits are selected through our annual open call for artists and curators. If you are interested in exhibiting at the AARC please stay tuned to our social media, website, and newsletter, where we will announce any available opportunities to submit exhibit proposals for our Community Exhibits Program. We do not review any exhibit proposals or art portfolios outside of our open call submission period.

Creative Workshop Program: If you are an artist or creative interested in leading a workshop with us, please contact the AARC's general email at aarc@austintexas.gov.

Permanent and Semi-Permanent Installations

Lotus

Lotus by Sunyong Chung and Philippe Klinefelter, 2013
granite, handmade ceramic tiles

Lotus is a large site specific sculpture created by Art in Public Places commissioned artists Sunyong Chung and Philippe Klinefelter for the Asian American Resource Center (AARC), and is located in the entrance plaza overlooking heritage live oaks.

Chung created an intricate and lively 12’ diameter mosaic of a lotus, made of hand-colored and hand-crafted dimensional tiles, which Klinefelter surrounded with seven 9’ tall hand-carved granite “petals” gracefully reaching toward the sky. Klinefelter also carved the lotus’s seed pod at the center of the mosaic from granite, which doubles as a gently flowing fountain. According to feng shui principles, the placement of the fountain near the AARC entrance creates positive chi, or energy, for the building. The lotus, native to Asia, was chosen as inspiration for the sculpture because of its symbolic attributes of harmony, purification and healing.

Prayer Phone

Prayer Phone | Semi-Permanent Art Installation

Prayer Phone, a handmade altar with a disconnected phone, is an invitation to the public to “call” their deceased loved ones while giving offerings and prayers. This project reflects a common custom of many Asian traditions: commemorating ancestors and venerating the spirit world.

Two essential elements compose this installation. The old fashioned phone is a symbolic artifact that represents humanity’s desire to connect and communicate with others. Its historic form evokes passage of time. By contrast, the spiritual act of lighting incense symbolizes the following: sacredness when the element of air is ignited, purification of the environment’s energy, and blessings in return for offerings. These two elements combine to help connect the earthly to the heavens.

This project is inspired by an episode of This American Life featuring stories about Telephone of the Wind in Otsuchi Town, a small seaside town in northeastern Japan. An iconic English telephone phone booth connected to nowhere was repurposed, and people began “calling” family members lost during the tsunami caused by the 2011 Great Japan Earthquake. Telephone of the Wind became a public space for people to grieve for their lost loved ones. In response, Prayer Phone shares in the deep tradition of respecting spirits and coexisting with entities beyond the physical realm, as well as providing a physical space and an outlet to feel connected with the departed.

Learn More

Past Exhibits

Past 2026 Exhibits

Lao Textiles: Connecting Threads Through Time, curated by Joanne Click with assistance from Dr. Palina Louangketh

The Mesh Threshold by Swathi Konduri

Migration and Integration, curated by Mai Deguchi, featuring five Asian Texan artists: Carme Pena, Ashley Adams, Emily Weerts, Evie Thompson, and Anna Pham

Stories of Home: A Photovoice Project, developed by AARC staff with contributions by AARC Senior Program participants

Ancestral Visions by Sandeep Chandran

Diaspora Offering by Allen Zewen Yu and Sun-Jue Shin

Past 2025 Exhibits

Peelander-Yellow: Let's Play on Planet-Yellow!!!

Mamie Raynaud: Chinatown in Three Acts

Rooted: Central Texan Artists in the Asian Diaspora

Reflections: Patchworks of Asian America

Tiffany Heng-Hui Lee: Elements Connected

Chie Endo x promqueen: Untangling: AANHPI Intergenerational Dialogues

Barnuevo Velasco (curator): Golden Years Weighing Philippine Martial Law 1972-1981

Past 2024 Exhibits