Looking Up: poems and paintings by Robert Y.C. Hsiung (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781979367233)

ROBERT Y. C. HSIUNG Born in China, Hsiung came to the U.S. in 1952 to attend college. He graduated from University of Illinois and Massachusetts Institute of Technology with degrees in Architecture. Hsiung enjoyed a long and successful career in architecture -- over five decades of practice and teaching, was named Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, and retired in 2004. Hsiung started painting watercolor in his teens, stopped in his 20's to pursue architecture full-time, resumed painting in his mid-50's and continued into his 80's. He is a Signature Member of the New England Watercolor Society and the Rhode Island Watercolor Society. Similarly, his writing of poetry began in his teens, continued through his 20's, stopped, and then resumed briefly in his 60's, writing in his native Chinese. At age 81, he returned to poetry with new-found passion, writing in English. Executed years apart, Hsiung's poems and paintings are driven by the same impulse that has propelled him in his pursuit of architecture. His watercolors freeze-frame his life's special fleeting moments, capture what he sees and feels and retell them without commentary. His poetry takes on the unseen and the unvoiced, and engages with his paintings in an ever-evolving dialogue, traversing visual and verbal boundaries across cultures and continents, as well as in his daily life.