Cynthia Tom is a visual multi-media artist, passionate about cultural identities, women’s issues and playing with the accepted norm. Surrealism provides the space for her ideas to grow, questions to be raised and color to inspire.
Cynthia is a seeker and philosopher about issues in our lives, her ancestors and the community of women. Her new artistic paths are inspired by dialog with friends and family, forming new themes and stories for her work, collaboration and brainstorming are her passion. Symbols, cues and clues fill her art, which is described as “Cultural Surrealism”.
Her work has been exhibited at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, the De Young Museum, S.F. and galleries from New York to San Francisco. She lectures on her work, women’s issues and Asian American Women in the Arts.
Cynthia is included in the Univ. of Purdue text book, “Women Artists of the American West”, edited by S. Ressler and “Traces of Migration and In-Betweeness: Poetics and Politics in Post-colonial Asian Women Artists”. by Laura Fantone, PhD-University of Padua, Italy and UC Berkeley. She is currently the Board President of AAWAA, Asian American Women Artists Association.
A third-generation Chinese American, Cynthia draws inspiration from divergent cultures. The resulting contradictions are expressed in a variety of ways. Eastern and Western symbols often share space on the same canvas.

Her strong female images evoke a longing for freedom of expression and a life of choice.

Her paintings persuade us to look beyond the aesthetic--to challenge stereotypes and traditional roles, questioning paradigms and encourages our internal dialogue.