RSVP Future Ancestor: Seeded Mythologies from the Adoptee Diaspora is a collaborative art and storytelling project by Chinese adoptee artists Eva Lin Fahey and Madeleine Conover, bringing people together through conversations around memory, identity, and belonging. This day-long participatory event invites adoptees and the broader Chinatown community to create a shared “living archive” through hands-on activities—including a collective net installation, personal history documentation, and talisman creation—honoring the past while dreaming for the future. This day-long gathering unfolds as a collaborative ritual of making, remembering, and imagining. While centering adoptee voices, it will also invite the broader Chinatown community into a shared space of reflection and creation. During a community lunch, the gathering opens to the broader Chinatown and Boston community. Participants will engage in conversation using Kau Chim-inspired prompt sticks, creating space for exchange across experiences and generations. In the afternoon, all attendees are invited to create paper talismans with Eva and Madeleine —one to keep, one to give to a fellow participant, and one to offer to Boston’s Chinatown. Grounded in the exhibition’s framing of Chinatown as a diasporic temple, these talismans honor the layered histories, griefs, and resilience of the neighborhood and its communities. To close the day, participants will gather around the net installation, collectively holding it as the talismans are held within its structure. Through a shared voicing of hopes, the group activates the net as a guardian/vessel—carrying forward dreams for the future. Schedule 1:00 –2:00 PM Community sharing with light lunch 2:00 - 3:30 PM Talisman creation activity 3:30 - 4:00 PM Ritual: activation of talismans About the Artists Madeleine Conover (she/her) Madeleine Conover is a Chinese American adoptee and artist. Her images and sculptures explore her ideas of Asian American diaspora and her adoption due to China’s former one-child policy. Her recent work focuses on the subsequent discovery of her biological family and community building with adoptees. Conover was raised in Washington, DC by a single mother. She received an MFA in Printmaking from the Tyler School of Art & Architecture and a BA in Studio Art and Sustainable Food & Farming from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her work has been included in solo and group exhibitions in Philadelphia, Western Massachusetts, New York City, and the Bay Area. She has participated in artist residency programs at Ceramics School, Directangle Press, Pyramid Atlantic Art Institute, Second State Press, Kala Art Institute, and Wassaic Project. Based in Philadelphia, she teaches printmaking and ceramics classes. She also recently started her own small risograph publishing press, Mad Dog Studio. Photo credit: Drew Johnson Eva Lin Fahey 张雯林 (she/her) Visual artist Eva Lin Fahey 张雯林 was born in Jingmen, China, durin...
