Feng-Feng Yeh discusses how the Chinese Chorizo, artistic practice and storytelling deepen community bonds and reconcile complicated histories.
2024 stART Grantee Feng-Feng Yeh is the artist behind the Chinese Chorizo Project, an initiative supported by MOCA Tucson and the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts. With support from the Arts Foundation, Yeh is leading free community mosaic tile workshops at MOCA Tucson, where participants are creating tiles that will become part of a large-scale public sculpture: The Most Sacred Heart of the Barrio (MSHB). The sculpture, shaped as two Chinese Chorizo links, honors a lost historic food that once symbolized community resilience and solidarity in Tucson’s Chinese and Mexican barrios.
Yeh (she/her) is a chef and multidisciplinary artist whose work spans food, fashion, and performance, exploring identity, feminism, and activism through the lenses of sensuality, nostalgic camp, and comedy. Through the Chinese Chorizo Project, she uplifts immigrant histories while building spaces of connection and cultural pride.
In recognition of this work, October was declared Chinese Chorizo Month by the Pima County Board of Supervisors, and Yeh was honored as the first-ever Tucson City of Gastronomy Food Visionary Award recipient.
Before launching her community-based culinary projects, Yeh was recognized for her NYC-based womenswear line, Savant, with features in Vogue and WWD (Women’s Wear Daily, a leading fashion industry publication). Her current practice transforms food into a multi-sensory art form, inviting audiences to reflect on consumption, performance, and collective memory across generations and geographies.
Sign-up for Free Community Workshops
The community is invited to take part in a free series of tile-making workshops led by artist Carlos Valenzuela, happening Thursdays from May 1–22, 5:30–7:30 PM at MOCA Tucson (265 S Church Ave). Participants will create mosaic tiles inspired by the spirit of the Chinese Chorizo—exploring themes of solidarity, community, resilience, survival, displacement, identity, immigration, and love. The completed tiles will be fired, documented, and incorporated into The Most Sacred Heart of the Barrio (MSHB) sculpture—a community-made artwork and lasting symbol of shared care, cultural memory, and collective strength.
No experience is needed—Community members will learn artistic theory inspired by themes from the Chinese Chorizo Project focusing on solidarity, community, resilience, survival, restoration, and love. Ceramic tile practices of hand glazing through paint brush, airbrush, squeeze bottle techniques, and relief work through press molds will be taught to explore ceramic expression with these themes.
- When: Thursdays, May 1, 8, 15, 22 // 5:30 – 7:30 PM
- Where: Museum of Contemporary Art [265 S Church Ave, Tucson]
- Who: Open to all community members who are interested in building solidarity through art!
- FREE
It is thrilling to be able to receive a Community Impact 2024 stART grant in partnership with MOCA Tucson because it will help to broaden access to arts education for historically underrepresented groups, enhancing our collective reach to community members often excluded from museum spaces, bringing these voices and stories into the public with each individual tile. Furthermore we are able to collectively explore how artistic practice and storytelling can deepen community bonds and reconcile complicated histories. This is a true gift to bring to our community.
Feng-Feng Yeh, Chef and emerging multi-disciplinary artist, brainchild of the Chinese Chorizo Project.