Red Bean Soup / 红豆汤 / Chè Đậu Đỏ / お汁粉
(2024)
(2024)
ft. Yi ‘11’ Zhou, Minh-An Pham, Kaede James Takamoto & Sherry Zheng
🌏 Seventh Gallery, Melbourne
Red Bean Soup brings together the work of Asian diasporic artists; Yi "11" Zhou, Kaede James Takamoto, Lê Nguyên Phương, Sherry Zheng, Minh-An Pham, and Adrian Jing Song.
The installation serves as a culmination of their experiences as they each make return trips to their hometowns, and grapple with the loss of loved ones, family secrets, fragmented memories, and feelings of un-belonging. Their shared struggle draws solace from the symbolism of the iconic Red Bean Soup. No one knows of the dish's origin, but it has made its way across Chinese, Japanese, Malaysian, and Vietnamese cuisine. Though the dish exists in a multitude of variations, the partaking of Red Bean Soup has always symbolised good fortune, happiness, and the overcoming of hardship.
Accompanying text by Tiia Kelly