San Francisco Chinese Culture Center, oldest of its kind in the nation, celebrates new permanent home in Chinatown

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) — A Taoist ceremony with holy water and chants blessed the grand opening of the San Francisco Chinese Culture Center’s new permanent home in the heart of Chinatown.

“This is such a historic moment for the community,” Jenny Leung, executive director, told the crowd gathered for the ribbon-cutting

The Chinese Culture Center is the oldest Asian American arts organization in the United States.

Leung said, for six decades, the center has played a role in shaping Chinatown’s activism and identity. She added that its new home also marks a new vision for the neighborhood.

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“A community-based arts organization that is still continuing to uplift our agency, our stories and our humanity,” Leung said.

San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie spoke of the center as a cultural anchor for Chinatown and for the city.

“I say this all the time: as Chinatown goes, so goes San Francisco,” said Mayor Daniel Lurie. “Arts, culture is going to drive San Francisco’s comeback. We are already showing it.”

The new space is designed for shops and multimedia exhibits, and it will incubate up-and-coming artists — all with a focus on continuity and lineage to Chinatown, said Hoi Leung, the center’s curator.

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“We are looking back at the archive, the exchanges, with our founders, you know. Just getting any space was a radical move,” Leung said.

The center was born in the middle of the civil rights movement. Over the decades, it has worked to build cultural power to fight for Chinese representation, especially coming off decades of racist immigration policy and exclusionary acts toward Chinese and other Asian Americans.

Saturday night’s 1960s-theme dance party is part of the weeklong grand opening celebration. Each day celebrating activism of a different decade, with a vision towards the future that is hoping to make Chinatown a museum without walls.

“Transformed into another very wonderful place, where you can continue to draw tourism, draw people to come, to learn about Chinatown, Chinatown’s history,” says San Francisco Supervisor Chyanne Chen.