From March 4 to March 31, 2026, Time Lag, a group exhibition presented by Asian Art Contemporary and supported by the Asian Artists Center, is on view at the Sasse Museum of Art in California. Curated by Dr. Huixian Dong, the exhibition brings together works by five artists active in the contemporary art scene: Hannah Bang, Jennifer Ling Datchuk, Yezi Lou, Sigrid Qian, and Shuai Xu. Taking “Time Lag” as a concept that encompasses both physical experience and psychological perception, the exhibition examines the delays, suspensions, and dislocations people encounter as they move across geographic borders, cultural contexts, and structures of identity.

“Time Lag” originally refers to the interval between one arrival and the next that has not yet occurred. For travelers—especially those who continuously cross borders, whether literal national boundaries or metaphorical cultural and psychological ones—this “time lag” is not merely a matter of adjusting clocks, but a state of being that can never be fully synchronized. It is not simply a depiction of “in-betweenness,” nor merely an emphasis on difference. Rather, it points to a liminal moment of near-arrival that never fully becomes arrival: a state marked by both a strong desire for transformation and the repeated encounter with absence, ambiguity, and disorientation.

As curator of the exhibition, Dong notes: “This exhibition explores the idea of the rhetorical capture of a state of ‘quasi-arrival yet a keen desire for complete transition,’ borrowing from the everyday experience of travelers, especially those who cross borders, where the embodied sense of time may diverge from the physical time measured by the clock. It is also inspired by the embodied experiences of the Asian art diaspora as well as the tragicomedy of Waiting for Godot, in which the anticipated arrival is, in fact, never coming.”

Centered on this proposition, the exhibition unfolds through three interconnected sections. The first, “Dream and Reality,” begins with the imaginative framework of the fairy tale The Story of Jack Spriggins and the Enchanted Bean, opening an unstable boundary between fantasy and reality. In Sigrid Qian’s paintings, thorned stalks continue to grow and extend, while goose-yellow and mysterious forms reach into unknown space, as if pulling reality toward a cosmic dimension not yet arrived at. Her imagery carries both the vitality of plant life and an unnameable alterity, causing viewers to oscillate between familiarity and estrangement. These surreal images do not offer direct answers; instead, through floating, spreading, and uncertain forms, they render “arrival” itself ambiguous and difficult to confirm.

The second section, “Collective Memory and Individual Narrative,” focuses on the inscription of identity within the experiences of Asian diasporic communities. Here, memories shaped by collective culture, native language, and social structure intertwine with individual growth, migration, and bodily perception. Jennifer Ling Datchuk’s video work addresses the critical and provocative process through which society “tames” the gendered body, in which braided hair coiled like a saddle becomes a highly symbolic visual form. By placing the body, adornment, and discipline side by side, her work reveals not only how the female body is viewed and shaped by society, but also the complex relations among tenderness, obedience, and repression.

Also in this section, Yezi Lou’s paintings turn toward personal experience and childhood imagery. Cultural memories that should feel intimate instead appear distant and unfamiliar in her work, as though memory itself has undergone a subtle but persistent displacement across time and geography. Through this visual language—at once affectionate and distorted—she touches upon a common emotion in diasporic experience: when one looks back at the past, familiar things no longer fully belong to the self they once did.

Hannah Bang’s performance practice reveals how artistic creation exists through bodily experience. As she moves through new environments and communities, creation itself becomes an embodied practice. Her work does not simply represent “movement”; rather, it allows the body to truly endure adaptation, pause, and imbalance within unfamiliar surroundings, transforming these subtle sensations into artistic language. What remains is a bodily memory of displacement, one closely tied to the condition experienced by many Asian diasporic communities—being perpetually seen as the “eternal outsider.”

The third section, “Rationality and Chaos,” extends the discussion from time into space. Materials, installations, and geometric structures initially suggest rational order, yet in the act of viewing and perceiving, space itself proves unstable. Shuai Xu’s work juxtaposes geometric clarity with fragmented installation, reflecting a reality that constantly wavers between order and disorientation. Structures that appear calm and precise do not ultimately provide stability; instead, through combination and rupture, they generate new forms of uncertainty. It is precisely within this tension that viewers come to sense that “time lag” exists not only on a temporal level, but also within the disjunctions of spatial perception, bodily experience, and judgments of reality.

Rather than offering a clear answer to “diaspora,” “migration,” or “identity,” Time Lag invites viewers to remain in that unfinished yet continuously unfolding moment: between arrival and absence, between familiarity and estrangement, between expectation and loss. In doing so, the exhibition asks us to reconsider how we perceive time, how we imagine belonging, and how we confront identities that remain perpetually in formation.

The exhibition has received attention and promotion from several media outlets, including LA Post and The New York Today. Richard Ren, cultural critic of LA Post, remarked: “In today’s globalized context, cultural identity is fluid. What we are seeing is not merely a statement of ‘Asian art abroad,’ but how mobility reshapes imagination, memory, and the meaning of ‘home.’” Curator Huixian Dong also stated: “It is such an honor to collaborate with our wonderful artists and with Asian Art Contemporary. This exhibition is another attempt in my curatorial practice to engage with philosophy, identity, and social issues.” Curator Webson Ji, who served as the producer of this exhibition, also expressed his high expectations: “Whether in New York or Los Angeles, the Asian diaspora art community has long been an integral part of the contemporary Asian art ecosystem. This dialogue I have produced seeks to bridge contemporary Asian art across the East and West Coasts of the United States, while also providing a platform for active Asian artists worldwide to fully present their work.”

Text by Jianing Lu, Image and text courtesy of Asian Art Contemporary

Exhibition Dates
March 4–31, 2026

Curator
Huixian Dong, Ph.D.

Artists
Hannah Bang, Jennifer Ling Datchuk, Yezi Lou, Sigrid Qian, Shuai Xu

Curatorial Assistants
Xinyue Zhang, Jianing Lu

Producer
Webson Ji

Supporting Organizations
Asian Artists Center, Sasse Museum of Art