Fiona Tien
Fiona Tien is a graduate of University of Michigan’s Penny W. Stamps School of Art and Design having concentrated in industrial design and sculpture.  
A third culture kid, born in Hong Kong and raised as an American expat in Beijing and Singapore. Fiona’s identity shifts based on her current location and peers. This paradoxical senses of self-identity follows into her creative practice as she doesn’t fully identify as either artist or designer.
The one clear identity she does have is as a lover of chairs.  She is fascinated in the representative and communicative nature that all sculptural and functional objects have. Objects, like chairs, surround and affect us daily and yet we do not acknowledge or understand them. As said by educator and architect Galen Cranz “we design them; but once built, they shape us.”  In her work, Fiona is motivated in creating experiences that evoke her audience or users to reflect and discuss the complexities in seemingly simple objects, actions and experiences. 
Fiona currently works as a studio assistant at the University of Michigan's  Materials Fabrication Studio (Product Design, Sculpture, and Metal Shop).