Se Mer

Art-making is the language that we all understand. It cuts across racial, cultural, social, educational, and economic barriers and enhances our cultural appreciation and awareness. Half of my work primarily focuses on my interest in traditional and modern architecture or landscape, like the materials and complexity of how certain things look. While the other focuses on the combination of my personal history and my interest in the issues affecting refugees, asylum seekers, and stateless persons.

 

I grew up in rural Thailand and when I first got to the United States what caught my eye were Victorian and modern architecture. Materials such as bricks and steel are really appealing to me, the way everything co-exists together – in modern and traditional buildings. These two eras blend so well even though they are two different things. The exploration of many dark and beautiful places sparked my interest in architecture and landscape. how certain buildings have their own history and personality – something mysterious about certain buildings that just fascinates me. The location of certain buildings contributes to the significance. How things are put in a certain location – why is it put there, what was the architect thinking, etc. I wanted to capture the isolation of the individual within the modern and urban scene. I want to connect viewers to their feelings and memories of familiar places such as a place we call home. Rather than mimicking real-life with hyper-realistic paintings, I translated the visible world into arrangements of color fields, lines, and geometric shapes. I draw a lot of inspiration from Richard Diebenkorn. I’m heavily influenced by his rich textures and vibrant colors that result from the many layers of paint that have been applied to his canvases. I have also been deeply influenced by his use of contrasting colors to divide up the canvas by his geometrical division of the canvas.

 

For my second body of work, I wanted to portray what life is like in the refugee camp. Refugees in Mae La live in small, densely packed huts made primarily with leaves and bamboo. Many residents have spent their entire lives in this isolated place, unable to work and dependent on outside aid. I primarily focused on the Karen refugees in Thailand and Myanmar due to my heritage. My family is originally from Myanmar, part of a minority group call, Karen. My family had to flee their village and leave everything behind when the Burmese soldiers showed up at their front door. I was born in this place called Mae La refugee camp on the borders of Thailand and Burma. Life in the refugee camp was like a prison due to the isolation and lack of food. This work creates connections through common experiences but also increases understanding.

 

Art has proven to be one of the most effective methods to create a sense of empathy and compassion. I want to connect viewers to understand what another person is experiencing. My work is a constant search for the best way to interpret my ideas in raising awareness. I like to reference from photographs or memory, but I reinvent some of the backgrounds through my color palette and distortion to make it more visually appealing. I get inspired by experimenting and exploring with vibrant color combinations. Each piece I create is simultaneously an extension from the past, where I've learned from the past, and a preview of the future.