Carole Frances Lung (born 1966) is an American artist and labor activist, known for her

performance art Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

which centers around subjects such as textile consumption, unfair labor practices, and production systems. Lung is an

associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. In the ''North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is a position ...

of Fashion Fiber and Materials at

California State University, Los Angeles California State University, Los Angeles (Cal State LA) is a public research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. It is part of the California State University system. Cal State LA offers 142 bachelor's degree programs, 122 m ...

. Her work concerns labor in the fashion industry and often comprises long-duration projects of performance art and collaborative art activism. She is based in

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...

Early life and education

Carole Frances Lung was born in 1966 in

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. She was raised in

Huntington Beach Huntington Beach is a seaside city in Orange County, California, United States. The city was originally called Pacific City, but it was changed in 1903 to be named after American businessman Henry E. Huntington. The population was 198,711 as o ...

. Lung received a

Bachelor of Science A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, B.S., B.Sc., SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree that is awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Scienc ...

degree in Textiles and Clothing from

North Dakota State University North Dakota State University (NDSU, formally North Dakota State University of Agriculture and Applied Sciences) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Fargo, North Dakota, United States. It was ...

in 1988. She moved to

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

to work in the fashion design industry. Lung studied Fiber and Material Studies at the

School of the Art Institute of Chicago The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a Private university, private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which gr ...

, receiving a BFA degree in 2005 and a MFA degree in 2007. During a 2006 semester abroad in

Weimar, Germany Weimar is a city in the German state of Thuringia, in Central Germany between Erfurt to the west and Jena to the east, southwest of Leipzig, north of Nuremberg and west of Dresden. Together with the neighbouring cities of Erfurt and Jena, i ...

, she studied Public Art and New Artistic Strategies at the

Bauhaus University The Bauhaus-Universität Weimar is a university located in Weimar, Germany, and specializes in the artistic and technical fields. Established in 1860 as the Great Ducal Saxon Art School, it gained collegiate status on 3 June 1910. In 1919 the s ...

. There she engaged in her performance piece "One Size Fits All," sewing out of a storefront.

Career

Carole Frances Lung has almost fifteen years of experience working in the garment industry. She uses her art as a form of activism which makes statements on various topics, such as

mass production Mass production, also known as mass production, series production, series manufacture, or continuous production, is the production of substantial amounts of standardized products in a constant flow, including and especially on assembly lines ...

and

consumption Consumption may refer to: * Eating *Resource consumption *Tuberculosis, an infectious disease, historically known as consumption * Consumer (food chain), receipt of energy by consuming other organisms * Consumption (economics), the purchasing of n ...

, and the value of thoughtfully made clothing. Lung's project ''Sewing Rebellion'' has as its goal to break the mass-production cycle of consumer textiles, and involves teaching participants to make and repair clothing. Her project， ''Made in Haiti'' (2009-2012) was a collaboration with Haitian tailors to create an alternative to the mass globalized textile market. Lung has also created performance art under the persona "Frau Fiber," an East German garment worker. Frau Fiber was born in

Apolda Apolda () is a town in central Thuringia, Germany, the capital of the Weimarer Land district. It is situated in the center of the triangle Weimar–Jena–Naumburg near the river Ilm, c. east by north from Weimar. Apolda station lies on the Ha ...

, Germany in 1966 and worked in garment and machine knitting factories until the fall of the

Berlin Wall The Berlin Wall (, ) was a guarded concrete Separation barrier, barrier that encircled West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, separating it from East Berlin and the East Germany, German Democratic Republic (GDR; East Germany). Construction of the B ...

. Frau Fiber takes inspiration from the folk character

John Henry John Henry most commonly refers to: *John Henry (folklore) John Henry may also refer to: People Artists and entertainers * John Henry (actor) (1738–1794), Irish and early American actor *Seán Ó hEinirí (1915–1998), known in English as John ...

; knitting or sewing by hand against faster technology, knowing that ultimately she will fail.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lung, Carole Frences 1966 births Living people American women artists School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni American performance artists People from Huntington Beach, California California State University, Los Angeles faculty 21st-century American women