Ada Chen’s body of work is a journey through memory and identity that invites the audience to step into the ever-changing nature of memory, to feel the weight of nostalgia, and to undergo self-reflection. Chen seeks to explore this dynamic topic, observing and creating through a new perspective, a personal standpoint. She uses a mix of traditional and unconventional materials, urging viewers to ponder their influence on the art's meaning. Chen has utilized printmaking methods such as woodblock, time-based media such as stop motion animation, and creative writing such as poetic narratives. Collectively, her works and words aim to spark an awareness within the audience in the form of a shift toward reflection, a reawakened sense of wonder, or perhaps an impetus for action.

Her work continuously explores notions of memories and nostalgia in a fast-paced capitalist society, bringing slowness and reflection, a focus she continues in “Home: Film Roll Series (working title).” In this artwork, Chen combines printmaking, valued for its hazy and indistinct representation of memories, with photography, chosen for its precision in capturing moments in time. Since 2023, she has worked on this artwork which confronts the judgments that society places on third culture children and the emotional impact of her childhood as a transformative experience. She reimagines our understanding of “home,” a feeling not limited by space nor capacity but connection. Taking inspiration from her journey as an immigrant, she guides the audience through a long path of the five main residential homes she has lived in since her childhood. By utilizing multiple variations of Google Maps, Chen was able to get a documentation of her residences and the road leading up to it. By etching bird-eye view perspectives of her homes, it encouraged her to create a geographically accurate but not too intricate depiction of her lived experience.

Chen is currently developing a new project titled “Family Odyssey (working title).” This sequence of artworks dive into the story of her birth, how her mother immigrated from Southern China to the US due to the “One-Child Policy” (a population control measure implemented in China that limited families to one child). With deep admiration and drive to shine light on pressuring stories, she commemorates her mother’s sacrifice while spreading awareness of the immigration crisis. Through the gathering of personal narratives in oral history, Chen crafts a work that unites affected immigrants, transforming neglected silence into emphatic activism.j