About me

Vivian Tong is a Chinese American artist and archivist building homes within in-between spaces. Her eerie and melancholy motifs and tones are borne out of the traditions of feminist surrealism, early 20th century children’s book illustrations, and East Asian urban legends. Her work is motivated by the futile desire to understand and explore the shared spaces of universal humanity found in physical and psychological spaces of unsettling uncertainty, primal fears, and marginality. Her figures in liminal spaces, “marginalia,” live out their own urban legends, and exist in eerie surreal dreamscapes that have neither beginning nor end. Throughout these somber scenes, seemingly unusual yet familiar patterns and objects are scattered- calling to mind the many limbo spaces each of us inevitably find ourselves in and the feelings of simultaneous anxiety, awe, curiosity, and dread they can provoke.

Born and raised in San Francisco, Vivian works as an archivist/arts manager by day and practicing artist by night. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums in San Francisco, CA; Los Angeles, CA; Provo, UT; and New York City, NY. Additionally, she has exhibited at pop culture events and fairs across the United States. She has an MA in Museum Studies and a BFA and has previously worked with the Chinese Historical Society of America museum, SFO Aviation museum and library, and the Yerba Buena Center for the arts. She has also volunteered as a juror for ApexArt, a visiting artist lecturer at San Francisco State University, and a board member with Western Neighborhoods Project/Open SF History.