She’s the Bay Area Abstract Expressionist who was written out of the history books by a field that didn’t know what to do with a lesbian Chinese American artist who also founded SOMarts, among other accomplishments. Her 2022 retrospective at Asian Art Museum, curated by Abby Chen, was eye-opening for all who were fortunate enough to see it, and this smaller gallery show is sure to help expose her work to a city that should’ve known not to overlook such a talented artist. Bing studied with artists Elmer Bischoff, Richard Diebenkorn, and Frank Lobdell, and each of their styles has clearly left a mark, but overall her wide-ranging gestures are more diverse than early influences would suggest. Her weirdly wonderful “Velasquez Family No. II” (1961), and later works like “Burney Falls” (1980), show that she’s in dialogue with the history of 20th-century abstract painting, while unique ink drawings like “Untitled (scroll)” (c.1986) demonstrate her refusal to limit herself. I spent extra time studying her late 1960s/early ’70s painting “Figurescape” (1971), a rare painting that renders a loving embrace between women at the hands of an Asian-American lesbian artist. Bing, lovingly called Bingo by those who knew her, refused to conform. Maybe the world is finally ready to take a close look at what she created.
— Hrag Vartanian, Hyperallergic
