To what extent are identity and belonging related to birth and birthplace? How do processes of art making and experiences of migration complicate this question? By illuminating little-known stories of artists and writers of Chinese descent in Britain, this talk explores how their lives and works challenge our commonsense ideas about Chinese identity and belonging. While family, ancestry and birthplace are often vital to our sense of who we are, this talk highlights how they relate to identity and belonging in complex and often unexpected ways. Diana Yeh's research lies in the interdisciplinary fields of art and migration. Her work explores the translocal lives and works of artists of Chinese descent in order to interrogate 'racial'/ethnic and national paradigms of identity and belonging. She is a Visiting Lecturer at the University of East London and is affiliated to its newly launched Centre for Migration, Refugees and Belonging.

1. Art, Migration and the Complexity of Belonging Diana Yeh, University of East London, d.yeh@uel.ac.uk Shih-I & Dymia Hsiung Li Yuan Chia Anthony Key

2. Shih-I Hsiung and Dymia Hsiung, c. 1930s

3. (Left to right): Shih-I Hsiung, director Gabriel Pascal(?), George Bernard Shaw and actress Wendy Hiller, c. 1941, possibly at Malvern Theatre Festival

4. Programme for Lady Precious Stream at the Kingsway Theatre, London

5. (Second from left): Dymia and Shih-I Hsiung with Eleanor Roosevelt

6. Esmé Percy, Maisie Darrell and Roger Livesey in Lady Precious Stream, 1938 Carol Coombe as Lady Precious Stream, 1935

7. Shih-I and Dymia Hsiung with their friend, the writer Chiang Yee, The Weekly Illustrated London, 12 September, 1936.

8. Dymia Hsiung, Flowering Exile: An Autobiographical Excursion , 1952

9. Photographs captioned ‘Off to do some gardening’ and ‘Reading is a favourite occupation with all the Hsiungs, and this is a usual scene’, from ‘The Happy Hsiungs’, Goodhousekeeping , 1946.

10. Li Yuan-Chia

11. The Li family home, Cha Dong, Guangxi Province, 2006

12. 1960, 26.3 x 38.8 cm

13. The Ton Fan group, mid-1950s

14. Folding scroll, 1963

15. Exhibition leaflet for 3+1 show, Signals Gallery, London 1966

16. Points, installation view, Camden Arts Centre, 2001

17. Points, Studio Exhibition, Boothby, Cumbria, 1968

18. Poem Discs, Environment, Little Missenden Festival, Buckinghamshire, 1970

19. Cha Dong, 2006

20. Bankside, Cumbria, 2005

21. Disrepairs to the LYC Museum, 2005

22. Sports facilities for a new generation, Cha Dong 2006

23. LYC Museum and Art Gallery, 1972–1983

24. LYC Art Room, late 1970s

25. The LYC Museum and Art Gallery, January 2005

26. Photograph, 1993, hand-coloured black and white print, 24 x 30 cm

27. Relief with moveable parts, 1993–1994

28. 35mm transparency, 1990

29. Anthony Key, in front of his work Bok Gwai (White Ghost) (2005)

30. Soy/Ketchup (1997) Bread/Noodles (1997) Chopsticks/Knife Fork (1997)

31. Yellow Peril (1997)

32. Jerusalem (2003)

33. Wish You Were Here (2005)

34. Soy/Newspaper Painting (1995)

35. Free Delivery (1999)

36. Trespassing (2000)

37. Walcot Chapel (2002)

38. Stills from Home (2004). DVD, 45 mins