MOCA TALKS with Roslyn Gamiel – Dong Kingman’s East Meets West

About the event

The Museum of Chinese in America invites you to a special evening with Roslyn Gamiel, whose extraordinary dedication helped preserve Dong Kingman’s monumental 1951 mural East Meets West. Newly installed at MOCA through a generous donation from Roslyn and Eugene Gamiel and the Gamiel family, the mural now enters a new chapter as part of the museum’s permanent collection. Moderated by Herb Tam, MOCA’s Chief Curator and Senior Director of Exhibitions and Programs, this conversation will explore the remarkable story behind the mural’s survival, restoration, and eventual journey to MOCA. Originally commissioned for the famed Lingnan Restaurant on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, East Meets West once greeted diners with a vivid and expressive vision of New York Harbor, where the Brooklyn Bridge rises above a traditional Chinese junk boat inspired by the artist’s childhood memories of Hong Kong. When the restaurant closed in 1980, the mural was damaged during removal and discarded among construction debris. It was Roslyn Gamiel, a former student of Kingman at Hunter College and a frequent patron of the restaurant, who recognized its significance and rescued it from destruction. In this conversation, Roslyn Gamiel will reflect on her personal relationship with Dong Kingman, the remarkable story behind the mural’s survival and restoration, and the decades-long journey that ultimately brought the work to MOCA. Through stories of art, memory, preservation, and community stewardship, this program offers a rare opportunity to learn how one historic artwork survived through the care and persistence of those who believed in its cultural importance. About Roslyn Gamiel Roslyn Gamiel first studied with Dong Kingman in 1952 while completing her senior year as an art major at Hunter College. Kingman’s teachings sparked a lifelong engagement with Chinese expressive ink painting and East Asian artistic traditions. Her later studies at China Institute included Mandarin language, Asian brush painting, and Chinese calligraphy under noted instructors Shirley Pu Wills and Gan Yu. Alongside her husband Eugene, Roslyn spent more than 35 years developing arts and literacy initiatives for children through the nonprofit organization Music Outreach, integrating music, storytelling, and visual art into early childhood education programs that reached tens of thousands of New York City students. She has also participated in exhibitions throughout the New York area and remains an active supporter of traditional East Asian brush painting practices through organizations including the Sumi-e Society of America.