Exhibition catalog for Radical Return《文字的回返》, the first exhibition presented by Radical Characters, a study group and curatorial project that explores the relationship between design and culture in the Chinese and Chinese American communities.

The exhibition, simultaneously mounted in 2021 at the Boston University Art Galleries in Boston, Massachusetts, and at IS A GALLERY in Shanghai, China, invited participants from around the world to use the Chinese character “回” (huí) or “return” as a grid—visually or conceptually—to frame submissions. The selected work, which appears in this catalog, features 36 Chinese and Chinese American artists and graphic designers who explore acts of return through language, tradition, memory, identity, and history. Working across a range of media, these designers and artists embrace, challenge, and expand what it means to "return" in their artistic practice and in relation to their positions in the world today.

Radical Characters acknowledges that the works by no means form a complete picture of the multifaceted and complex narratives experienced by Chinese and Chinese American designers, but offers the exhibition—the accompanying catalog—as an in-progress site for building knowledge through the exchange of graphic design and culture.

With work by Evelyn Bi, Elias Chen, Weiyun Chen, Xing Cheung, Muyuan He, Gene Hua, Oliver Hua, Felix Huang, Howsem Huang, Cecily Li, Daedalus Guoning Li, Jay Li, Qiuwen Li, Angela Lian, Guang Qin Lin, Leslie Liu, Chen Luo, Yuedi Lyu, Maya Man, Candice Ng, Zhengzhong Pan, Desmond Pang, Tongji Philip Qian, Jiang Shan, Karen Tian, Mac (Naiqian) Wang, Zihao Wang, Yufei Weng, Bin Wu, Boyang Xia, Spencer Yujia Yan, Nina Jun Yuchi, Zhang Zhan, Dan Zhang, Eager Zhang, and Zipeng Zhu


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