On Art, Fashion, and What It Can Mean to Be Asian American

Simon Wu is a curator and writer, currently in the PhD program in history of art at Yale University. This is not a book to be inhaled quickly. It’s really one to take your time with and I found myself doing web searches for some of the art the author references, not because he doesn’t do a good job describing it but because he does write about it so magnificently well that I wanted to see it for myself. I appreciate reading about the art world through a queer, Asian American lens.

It’s been decades since I’ve been to a club but the author’s descriptions are so palpable and thorough that I immediately felt myself transported to the queer clubs and dance parties of my 20s. That being said, this is bittersweet nostalgia. The author writes about being an outsider in such spaces, spaces that are gay or queer and overwhelmingly white. He also writes about being in inclusive and intentional spaces, queer and Black and brown spaces and how powerful that can be both for the individual and for the collective. The author parallels his experience in these spaces with that of the art world, be it in the disproportionately white spaces of well-funded and “prestigious” museums and galleries or within the Asian American art collectives that focus on disrupting and dismantling the exclusionary system.

I was constantly fascinated by the ways in which the author pulls together seemingly disparate narratives about art and EDM and being an American abroad and exclusive queer dance parties and New York’s Chinatown and much-coveted Telfar bags and drugs and of course, the pop icon Robyn. I love the care the author takes when writing about both his loved ones, family and friends alike, as well as the artists and writers and various people who have touched his life, whether he knew them personally or not. He repeatedly circles back to the themes of dismantling a system versus leveraging one’s position within a system to help others and this resonates heavily. This is an engaging read that has deepened my understanding of the art world, fashion, and what it can mean to be Asian American.