Meng Elizabeth Tang is a Chinese-American media artist, art curator, and art professor well known for her photography, video installations and performance art. Tang uses her art to explore the themes of communication, gender, culture & politics. She hones on her experiences growing up in China to create a basis in which she communicates with her audience. Meng who currently resides in the US has featured in several exhibitions internationally including the Ping Yao International Festival. Tang was in 2010 listed as a Distinguished Alumni of the University of Minnesota China Center.
Career and education
Tang was born and raised in Tianjin, China and received her bachelor's degree from the Beijing Film Academy in 1996 and proceeded to earn a master's degree in Media Arts in 2006 from New York University NYU. She also earned an MFA in Experimental New Media, from the University of Minnesota in 2010, where she became the first Chinese national to obtain an MFA from the University. She began her career as an IT Specialist at the Beijing Film Academy in 1997 and later moved on to become a lecturer in the Department of Cinematography at the Academy. Tang has since held various positions in academia including being a Visiting Scholar at Duke University and a Faculty member at the University of Minnesota Department of Art. Meng today, who still lectures at the University of Minnesota, sits as the Vice-President of the Minnesota Chapter of the Women’s Caucus for Art, and the Vice President of the International Association of Female Artists. Meng’s work has been featured & exhibited at the Kobe Biennale in Japan, Chengdu Biennale in China & the Ping Yao International Festival in China Some of her work like The Soap Factory with Guo Gai & Slinko has drawn some attention from the communist authorities in China, given their very expressive political nature. Guo was in 2011, in unrelated incidents, arrested in China, for attending an event at the Beijing Contemporary Museum of Art that was allegedly related to the "Jasmine Revolution".
Exhibitions
Below are a list of exhibitions Tang has featured in
2014 The 14th Pingyao International Photography Festival
2012 Conceptual Renewal – A Brief History of Chinese Contemporary Photographical Art Sishang Art Museum, Huosi Rd. East, Zhangxizhuang, Shunyi Dist., Beijing, China
2009 Experimental And Media Arts, Katherine E. Nash Gallery, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN Scholarship Exhibition, Regis Center For Art, Minneapolis, MN
2008 Water, Wood, And Sky, Beijing Film Academy Gallery, Beijing, China
2008 Why You Belong, Burnet Art Gallery, Minneapolis, MN
2008 To The Bind, Rosalux Gallery, Minneapolis, MN
2008 Culturing Technology: Art & Technology 1968–2008, Regis Center For Art, Minneapolis, MN