At The Other Art Fair Brooklyn, artist Yin Ming transforms a familiar sport into a powerful metaphor for communication, identity, and human connection.
Some artists paint what they see.
Others paint what they feel.
For Brooklyn-based artist Yin Ming, painting has become a way to explore something much more elusive: the space between people trying to understand one another.
At The Other Art Fair Brooklyn, visitors stopping by Booth 75 encountered paintings that immediately sparked curiosity. Colorful, energetic, and playful at first glance, the works carried a deeper conceptual foundation rooted in language, communication, and the complexities of everyday interaction.
For the past four years, ping pong has been at the center of Ming’s artistic practice.
Not necessarily the sport itself, but what the game represents.
The back-and-forth rhythm of a ping pong match became a visual metaphor for conversations, misunderstandings, translations, negotiations, and the countless ways people attempt to connect with one another.
The idea arrived unexpectedly.
During a conversation with a friend, Ming began using the term “ping ponging” as a verb to describe moving between languages, switching between different forms of communication, and adjusting the way we speak depending on who we are talking to.
It was an experience she realized almost everyone shares.
We speak differently with family than we do with strangers. We communicate differently in public than we do in private. We move constantly between identities, social expectations, and emotional realities.
Ping pong suddenly became the perfect symbol.
What followed was a body of work that uses the sport as a framework for exploring dialogue itself.
For Ming, painting begins less with images and more with conversations.
Ideas emerge from interactions, observations, struggles, anxieties, and moments when communication succeeds or fails. Those experiences become raw material for paintings that often feel spontaneous and alive.
Unlike artists who carefully sketch compositions before beginning, Ming prefers to keep the process open.
She has experimented with planning and drawing beforehand, but ultimately found that the first instinctive response carries an energy that is difficult to recreate later.
Instead, she allows the painting to evolve directly on the canvas.
The result is a practice built on trust.
Trust in intuition.
Trust in improvisation.
Trust in the unexpected.
That openness extends to her working schedule as well.
While she enjoys painting during daylight hours and appreciates the benefits of natural light, inspiration rarely follows a strict timetable. A painting session might happen in the middle of the day or late into the night. Whenever the urge to create arrives, she follows it.
Her studio rituals are equally revealing.
Before painting, she often spends twenty or thirty minutes searching for the perfect playlist or podcast. What she jokingly describes as a bad habit has become an important part of preparing her creative environment.
Yet it is the end of her studio sessions that reveal something particularly meaningful about her process.
Cleaning brushes, organizing materials, and carefully resetting the workspace have become a reflective ritual. During those quiet moments, she reviews what happened that day, thinks about what worked, what did not, and leaves notes for herself about where to begin next time.
The paintings may emerge organically, but they are supported by a thoughtful practice of observation and reflection.
Small notes scattered around the studio often contain reminders, ideas, and fragments of future possibilities.
Interestingly, painting is only one part of Ming’s creative life.
During the pandemic, she found herself searching for new ways to support herself and became involved in the world of handmade soaps and personal care products. What began as a practical necessity evolved into a long-term collaboration with a soap maker in Bushwick.
Today, she helps create soaps, candles, bath salts, and bath bombs while maintaining her painting practice.
Rather than competing with one another, the two worlds complement each other.
Creating functional objects provides a different kind of fulfillment. One side of her life is devoted to making things that serve others in tangible ways. The other allows her to explore deeply personal questions through art.
Together, they create a balance between utility and expression.
Between service and self-discovery.
Between the practical and the poetic.
As her artistic career continues to grow, Ming is preparing for future exhibitions while also looking ahead to an upcoming publication feature. Though details remain under wraps for now, the recognition reflects the increasing attention her work is receiving.
What makes Yin Ming’s practice so compelling is her ability to transform something ordinary into something profound.
A ping pong match becomes a metaphor for language.
A conversation becomes a painting.
A game becomes a reflection on what it means to be understood.
In a world where communication often feels fragmented, rushed, or incomplete, her work offers a reminder that connection is rarely simple.
Like a ping pong rally, meaningful dialogue requires movement, attention, adaptation, and the willingness to keep the exchange alive.
And sometimes, the most important thing is simply keeping the ball in play.
About Tarik Talk Podcast
Tarik Talk Podcast takes listeners inside museums, galleries, artist studios, art fairs, and creative spaces around the world through conversations with artists, curators, collectors, cultural leaders, and creative professionals.
Hosted by Tarik Mendes, the podcast has featured more than 200 episodes across 50 seasons, filmed in over 10 countries and heard by audiences worldwide.