Ling Chiu
Ling’s work shifts between themes of memory, empire and migration, underpinned by formal explorations of printmaking processes.
Her continuing body of work, ‘Pigeons’, is inspired by the mass population of squatters occupying the Royal Iris, an abandoned ferry near her studio in Woolwich. Individual birds are lovingly set against bright colours and cherry blossoms, while anonymous interloper communities perch unwanted aboard ship.
Ling also explores our relationship with the natural and nurtured urban environment. Work is created by foraging plant life on her daily walk along the Thames Path in Woolwich, observing the shifting tides of a granite outcrop in British Columbia, or sketching her kitchen snake plant.
Ling graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art with an MFA in 2007. She has worked as a technician in studios and higher education for the last 20 years, researching inclusive pedagogy in making spaces. Her studio practice focuses on lower toxicity and more sustainable printmaking methods and materials, which has taken her on research residencies to Wales, the Netherlands and the United States. She is an elected member of The London Group, the UK's longest-running and most prestigious art collective.
