I met Christina in 2014 when she was a gallery manager at the Klein Sun Gallery in NYC, which represents Chinese contemporary artists. That spring, we sat together for dinner after an exhibition opening, and had a wonderful conversation about the shifting connections between Asian and Asian American art. I was barely a year into my job as a curator, and New York’s art world felt so foreign and intimidating – but Christina expressed genuine interest in my work and the topics I was just beginning to feel my way through, and that was the encouragement I needed.
Later that year Christina invited me to collaborate on curating a performance with the artist Liu Bolin. The gallery was preparing for an exhibition featuring his latest body of work, Security Check – a series of sculptures depicting him and others standing with their hands up, as commentary on the cost we pay for a false sense of safety. It was August, and protests in Ferguson had just erupted in response to the murder of Mike Brown.
I noted that Liu’s work had commonalities with the demonstrators’ “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” stance, and how powerful it would be to highlight those connections. Christina was supportive of bridging Liu’s work with Ferguson as an act of solidarity with the movement for Black lives, and we spent the afternoon calling up venues and participants around the city. Liu ended up having to leave for an emergency trip back to China so the project never came to fruition, but the experience brought me closer to Christina and the rest of the gallery’s staff, and offered me my first taste of curating with an international artist.
During my trips to NYC I’d visit the gallery and find Christina there to greet me with her wide smile, her warmth and friendliness. The art world wasn’t so foreign anymore. Our last correspondence was at the end of that year, when she informed me that she was leaving the gallery to travel the world and figure out her next move. She went on to do amazing things and inspire so many others.
Christina Yuna Lee will live forever in my heart as the incredibly sweet spirit who gave me confidence and support when I was a new and inexperienced curator. She was a brilliant creative who cared deeply about art and artists, and what we could do together with our imaginations. I was hesitant to share about our brief, beautiful moments together, but with so much being discussed about her death, it’s important to center who she was for our world, and how she left an impression on others so naturally and generously. Christina lived the kind of a life that is worth being remembered for, and she lived it fully.