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Nov 22, 2019

"All things are possible through the openness of our mind, the gentleness of our spirit, and the act of understanding and embracing." --Lily Yeh

Lily Yeh: Fire in the Darkness of a Winter's Night

Lily Yeh was a successful painter and professor at Philadelphia's University of the Arts when she returned to Beijing in 1989 to display her artwork. While there, she witnessed the tragic events of Tiananmen Square and came to realize that, "being an artist is not simply about making art...It is about delivering the vision one is given...and about doing the correct thing without sparing oneself." She pursues her vision through her organization, Barefoot Artists, Inc., which instructs resident and artists on how to replicate the Village model in damaged communities worldwide. In this interview, Yeh recounts the influence of her home country, China, the teachings of the Tao, Confucius, and Buddhism, and describes the process of the Village model as she initially conceived it and its organic and on-going evolution.