Mandate

By Students, For Students
Cheng Huai is a platform created by students, for students—offering opportunities to engage with the art world and gain hands-on experience. Through initiatives that challenge, explore, and deepen the understanding of contemporary art, we aim to support emerging artistic practices and their evolving creative journeys.

A Laboratory for Ideas
Cheng Huai acts as a creative laboratory—an open space for experimentation, dialogue, and bold ideas in the arts. We move beyond the familiar and the conventional, embracing curiosity and critical perspectives to explore new artistic frontiers.

Fostering Interdisciplinary Connections
We promote collaboration across disciplines, encouraging dialogue between diverse fields and backgrounds. Through these intersections, we cultivate a holistic understanding of art that bridges gaps and sparks innovation at McGill, Montreal, and beyond.

Non-Profit
As a non-profit initiative, Cheng Huai is powered by fee-levies, grants, and grassroots fundraising. We are committed to accessible, community-driven programming shaped by student voices.

Leaving a Lasting Footprint
Through our website, we document and archive each of our initiatives at Cheng Huai, much like a living museum, preserving contributions for future students and audiences, and forging a legacy that aims to inspire and inform the next generation of students.

The name "Cheng Huai" (澄怀) is drawn from the texts of tenth century Chinese aestheticist and philosopher Zong Bing.

It professes a metaphysical disposition wherein the subject and object become a whole in aesthetic appreciation, and the self soars in its transcendence of physical experiences.

Carrying the spiritual message of "Cheng Huai" with ourselves, we hope to embark on an elevated journey wherein we, through intimate contact with art and the spaces which create it, might also ascend into an aesthetic appreciation which unifies, transcends, and renders whole.