Exhibitions :: Events :: Announcements
Arise. Shine. Thy Light is Come.
A film by Tamotsu Timo Tome
Produced by Manoa Sky Films
Release date: December 12, 2023
While working on a mural at LAX, I had the privilege of meeting Tamotsu as he and his family were flying in from Hawaii. As life would have it, we had the opportunity to spend the day together on site, discussing faith as a driving force, life and the meandering paths it offers to us, love and family, our lingering hopes for the future, among other important topics. It was a joy to commune with him, as we both worked out our craft—him behind the lens, and me behind the brush.
View Manoa Sky’s documentary film Arise. Shine. Thy Light is Come that captures the creative process and the heart behind the mural and the life’s work.
Manoa Sky Films has a heart to document the heart of the people whose heart is to serve. What an immense blessing to be sharing in this life with these precious ones!
My deepest gratitude to Tamotsu for your grace, generosity, and most intentional work. And much extended thanks to Tim for helping to make this happen!
More info on Arise. Shine. Thy Light is Come.
That We Should Be Heirs
A call to community to contribute writings about fear for That We Should Be Heirs.
During this international refugee + immigration crisis (that has never not been), my work has shifted focus toward those who are targeted and the allies who have stood firm alongside them during the fight for freedom and justice. With this in mind and in heart, I’ve developed artwork that calls for participation, inviting our fellow humanitarians to take part in the creative process with the collective aim to become one voice in the work(s) of art. That We Should Be Heirs invites us to look directly at our fears, that we may acknowledge them, confront them, and in hope and indwelling strength, victor over them.
Learn more about how you can contribute your writings to this project. I’d love to receive your writings (that will remain unread) to be part of That We Should Be Heirs!
*Confession: When I first installed the project at SDAI, I had to very much confront my own fears. I interrogated myself: “Who am I to ask others to relive their fears, and then address them? I have not earned this privilege. Who is to trust this?” With lingering doubt, I myself contributed 50 letters about fear, feeling like no one would want to take part in such a trusting task for a project that was made by an individual that they most likely do not know. The scrolls were an integral part of the installation, so I took it upon myself to create what I thought might be the few scrolls that would take residency inside the expansive (and intimidating) length of wall. To my utter joy and surprise (!) , after 4 months of exhibiting and workshopping, the project received over two thousand (how?!) contributions! A true testament to our need to purge these fears, perhaps together, and that when given a safe and loving space to do so, how willing we are to step into vulnerability and share our fears. Art does this for us, and I’m so grateful to have been given this personal language to deal with the messy work of humanness!
Thank you for gracing this project with your words, your hands and your hearts. Truly. With love, Trinh
Installations and workshops for That We Should Be Heirs will be traveling to the following locations:
November 3, 2022 Stanford University, Stanford, CA
May 28 - September 4, 2022 Triton Museum of Art, Santa Clara, CA
February 4 - December, 2021 Gallery 51, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams, MA
April 12, 2019 Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
April 3 - May 3, 2019 Gould Gallery, College of Built Environments, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
February 16 - May 12, 2019 San Diego Art Institute, San Diego, CA
Shorelines: Southeast Asia and the Littoral (Current)
Published by Wasafiri Magazine, London, England
Publish date: Winter 2023
I’m very excited about having work published in this special issue of Southeast Asia and the Littoral, and also on the cover.
The sea holds history, and the Southeast Asian seas have witnessed mass exodus, carrying immigrants and refugees to neighboring shores. While oceans hold sustenance and the salt that makes all life possible, it also brews tumults that claim lives.
From the editors: Indeed, surrounded by oceans, seas and straits, with its multiple histories of maritime empires and nations, Southeast Asian and Southeast Asian diasporic texts offer new and complex aesthetics and poetics of water bodies, water worlds, and cultures. This collection seeks to add Southeast Asian and Southeast Asian diasporic perspectives to the transnational contexts and conversations of the Oceanic, holding a geographical spread of works that consider the region’s muiltple languages, regions, and nations.
Watermark: Vietnamese American Poetry & Prose, 25th Anniversary Edition
(Current)
Published by DVAN and Texas Tech University Press Edited by Barbara Tran, Monique Truong, and Khoi Luu
Publish date: April 2023
Author’s panel: Saturday, June 3, 2023 10am-9pm PST
Location: Santa Ana Public Library, Santa Ana, CA (learn more)
Book launch and celebration: Thursday, November 16, 2023 7-9pm EST (learn more)
Location: 1969 Gallery, 39 White Street New York, NY 10013
Watermark: Vietnamese American Poetry & Prose was first published in 1998 by the Asian American Writers’ Workshop In celebration of Vietnamese American writers.
It is my honor to be contributing some words and visual artwork to Watermark’s 25th Anniversary Edition. One of my mixed media works will appear on the cover, encasing the rich words of our contemporary Vietnamese American writers. How exciting to be included in this celebration of Vietnamese American literature.
Thank you, Barbara, Monique, and Khoi for the invitation to contribute.
Watermark mentioned in USA Today
<< an excerpt from a piece titled From the Snare of the Fowler, 2019
Photography by arabela espinoza
Tracing Roots: Trinh Mai Finds the Beauty in Life through Honoring Cultural Heritage.
An interview with Michèle Jubilee
Published by Content Magazine, San José, CA
Publish date: Spring 2023
Location: Open San José, 38 South 2nd Street, San José, CA 95113
Friday, March 3, 2023 5pm: Fashion show by Artist|Designer Tuấn Trần presented by Chopsticks Alley
6:30-9:30pm: Content Magazine release party for issue 15.2, Sight and Sound, Issue 15.2
I am elated to have been working with Content’s beautiful team for Issue 15.2. These past couple years have blessed Hiền and I with the opportunity, time, and support to travel along the coast as we continue serving in our béloved Bay Area and Southern California communities. It has filled us with great joy to be cultivating the crop that we’ve grown together for twenty years (Thank you San José State for sowing the seed. xo ). I am humbled to be included in this publication that is dedicated to sharing the processes and stories of Bay Area creatives.
I’ll also have a couple works in display at this event, as Content rings in its 11th year of publications, featuring 1,500+ creative individuals. Congratulations to Content!
Thank you, Daniel, for inviting me to share in my love for art and faith with your team and with our communities in these pages. Thank you, Arabela Espinoza for the beautiful photos and enlivening me with the fervor for the work that we get to do together. Thank you, Ms. Michèle Jubilee, for the edifying, encouraging conversation. I will sip on this experience for days.
Content is a quarterly print magazine that tells the stories of creatives making work in the South Bay Area.
Of Scrolls and Tears: Trinh Mai’s Archival Art and Organic Ephemera (Current)
Verge: Studies in Global Asias Portfolio 9.1
Published by University of Minnesota Press
Publish date: Spring 2023
I am pleased to announce that my artwork will be featured on the cover of Verge’s upcoming issue, accompanied by an essay by Howie Tran, lecturer at Brandeis University whose research focuses on the legacies of the war in Việt Nam and the state of South Việt Nam in diasporic literature from the U.S. and France.
Verge is a journal of the Asian Studies Program, Penn State University. This means so very much to me, since my family has such a rich history on Penn State campus. After settling at the refugee camp in Indiantown Gap, PA, my mother and several of my aunties and uncles graduated from Penn State. My Ông Bà Ngoại (Grandparents) spent time organizing the family band to perform traditional Vietnamese music and áo dài fashion shows to introduce their new American neighbors to Vietnamese culture.
And now an opportunity to collaborate with Penn State to share a new generation of art. I love when things come full circle like this.
She Slept. We Wept.
Published by Woman Scream International Poetry and Arts Festival, La Romana, Dominican Republic
Woman Scream is a proud partner in the worldwide initiatives of UN Women for the eradication of women violence.
It is my great honor to have a poem published in Woman Scream’s 13th anniversary of their international anthology. I wrote the poem She Slept. We Wept. in honor of my dear sister Jenny shortly after she passed away in August 2022 from metastatic breast cancer, and my heart upwells for this opportunity to continue sharing her story.
I’m very excited to be uniting with 44 women from 20 different countries, as our poetry collides in this anthology!
Thank you, Woman, for allowing me to share Jenny’s most beautiful, triumphant, and fulfilling life.
We love and miss you, JennyBoo.
Conversations with Trinh Mai
Published by VoyageLA
Publish date: January 18, 2023
It was my pleasure to be interviewed by VoyageLA, and to have been offered some space to speak on inspiration, work ethic, and the struggles in the hardship.
It’s nice to take some time to reflect on the specific characteristics that might make for success. (This also depends on how we define success, which for me is the point when I am fulfilled in the work.) We are such complex creatures, who harbor qualities that ebb and flow, shine and dissolve, whose rhythms we can hardly keep up with as days come and go. We change. They change us. But some are rooted deep and grip onto our ankles as they did for the ancients.
It’s such a privilege to have this kind of support. Grateful for every iota of it.
Meet Trinh Mai | Fine Art Professional
Published by Shoutout SoCal
Publish date: November 8, 2022
A SoCal shoutout to Shoutout SoCal for taking some time to interview me for a profile piece. I was nice to take a couple steps back and reflect on my career, recognize the folks who have guided me here, to share in the Whys of the work, and to mention the ones who have walked with us as we seek our path.
A big thank you to Sadry Hedayat, who nominated me for this interview, and Patrick for the feature!
Visitations: Three Paintings
For EcoTheo Review
I am happy to announce that I will have three paintings published in this summer’s issue of EcoTheo Review. The abstract paintings that the editors have chosen were created from 2003 to 2011, so it warms my heart deeply that they will be resurfacing after so long.
The EcoTheo Review was founded in 2013 at Princeton Theological Seminary as a literary journal dedicated to “enlivening conversations and commitments around ecology, spirituality, and art.” EcoTheo celebrates and shares original writing, visual art, interviews, book reviews, and scholarly articles that explore questions of religion and spirituality within contexts of ecology.
Thank you, Shann and Jason, for the invitation.
Flesh of my Flesh in Asian American Law Journal
Volume 28 | Issue
Published by Asian American Law Journal at Berkeley Law
In 2020, the Asian American Law Journal (AALJ) included artwork in her journal for the first time since first published in 1993, and it is my privilege to again have my work printed in her forthcoming issue.
AALJ’s will be publishing Flesh of my Flesh, a work of art that stands and mourns and holds fast with the ones who have fallen prey to corruption within the immigration system that has fractured their lives and the lives of those who love them.
This feature of Flesh of my Flesh is an excerpt from my full interview with AALJ, History as Medium: A conversation with Artist Trinh Mai, that took place earlier this year. While this interview has been shelved for the time being, until the season arrives for it to reemerge, I am humbled by the graciousness of the AALJ editorial team to be publishing this brief prelude to our interview. My deepest gratitude to the AALJ team for their compassion and understanding and for standing with us.
A humanitarian crisis plagues the U.S.–Mexico border. See just how deadly it is.
By Elissaveta M. Brandon
Published by Fast Company Magazine
We are so very pleased to announce that our show Hostile Terrain has been mentioned in Fast Company Magazine, bringing a greater awareness to the immigration crisis within the sea of global catastrophes.
During Hostile Terrain’s 11-month run at Gallery 51, we artists had ample opportunities to make meaningful connections with the Berkshire community as we discussed the humanitarian crisis, witnessed through the lives of those who seek a life free from poverty and violence.
Armfuls of gratitude to MCLA, Curator Erica Wall and the Gallery 51 Team, Dr. Anna Jaysane-Darr and MCLA faculty and students, and Sanctuary City Project. And a special thanks to Jason De León for carrying on this important work, and for generously contributing the article around our show.
How Suffering and Storytelling Can Form Us into People of Justice: An Interview with Artist Trinh Mai
Interview with Christians for Social Action of Eastern University, PA
I have had an opportunity to discuss my work as it pertains to themes of faith and the way that, in its true form, it can continue bringing us closer to compassion, empathy, justice, and righteous behavior.
As people of faith—flawed, hopeful, and trusting in the progress that is born first from transformation—my husband and I have straddled these seemingly disparate worlds (disparate because some tend to assume they are as such, although they are so very connected), with the hope to live out our faith while also helping to shine a light upon these very real issues that some do not see, do not know, or do not want to believe.
This was an encouraging opportunity to focus on the true teachings of scripture, rather than on the ways that people have distorted and perverted the teachings for their own self-inflation.
Thank you, Kristyn and Laurie for the invitation to discuss the dark subject of immigration in a faithful light.
Atomic Theory 7: Poems to My Wife and God
Published by Wipf and Stock Publishers
What a blessèd way to begin the new year with a new book!
I am deeply humbled to collaborate with Shann Ray on this book of poetry and art.
Faith amid war. Forgiveness in the wake of genocide. Intimacy and heartache. Forgiveness as an act of love. Light as the bearer and the taker of life. In these pages, we look to God as the light in which we can find peace as we examine, take part in, and navigate through a fractured world. With foreword by Kristin George Bagdanov.
Thank you, Shann and everyone involved in this meaningful project, driven by the love of family and humanity, and kinship founded upon art, light, and a love for God. (a peek into Shann’s heart.)
Order your copy and read our reviews and interviews:
Hanna Dierdorff. Gathered Together in the Dark: An interview with Trinh Mai and Shann Ray. Welcker, Ellen. The Intimate and Atomic Other: Fusion in the poems of Shann Ray and the Art of Trinh Mai Abbott, Katherine. Unison stronger than fission: Poetry and art hold a light in hard times. Hammett, Stephanie. Local poet and professor explores ‘ultimate forgiveness’. Atomic Theory 7 included on list of The best books of Locally Writ in 2020 by The Spokes-man Review. Hoover, Joe. When poetry meets spirituality for America: The Jesuit Review of Faith &n Culture. Mobley, Karen. Shann Ray for Art Chowder Magazine.
Atomic Theory 7, a collaboration in the truest sense between the fiercely-imagined poems of Shann Ray and the sacramental art of Trinh Mai, considers a most uncommon union between the lover and the beloved: the body at rest and war, in beauty and peace, in violence and despair, in the finality of darkness and the atomic fusion that beckons new life. The unity between dark and light in Atomic Theory 7 is open, composed of untold force, robustly unknowable, and intimately attuned. Even the most forbidding trauma is not in vain. From the ashes of holocaust, love becomes an essential human gift found not only in casting one’s eyes upward, but in visceral, physical gestures: a healing hand on the chest of friends and strangers, a loving embrace between enemies. The breath of the holy over the wristbones of a child. A touch of the numinous at the zenith of the shoulder blades. God in all things. Breath. Whisper. Song. Here it is not the Divine who commits genocide but people, and in the heartrending aftermath, we are given the grace to meet one another again, kiss each other in peace, and go forth fused with atomic responsibility.
Why Do You Look at Me and See a Girl?
Authored by Anvi Hoang
Published by Guernica World Editions
In 2016, I met an extraordinary couple—a writer of music and a writer of stories. We have remained friends through the years, encouraging each other in pursuit of creative risk, lifting each other when doubt sneaks into the work, supporting each other during daunting processes, and celebrating with each other artistic accomplishments great and small, because we know that each one coalesces into who we are as artists. Since then, they’ve been living with one of my paintings, Sữa Xưa (Milk of Old)—a portrait of my great grandmother and my mother watching over their household, reminding us that our ancestors remain with us. It is my joy and privilege to announce that their (our) work of art envelops Anvi’s words. Congratulations, Anvi, on this great accomplishment!
Synopsis:
Making coal patties. Selling liquid soap. Shopping at a glittering shoe mecca. She’s done them all, having lived half of her life in a deprived-post-war-communist-Vietnam-turned-free-market. Arriving in America at 29 and experiencing life here as an adult is a push toward her transcending journey to transform herself from an international student, to a naturalized American, to a new self—free of the dead past and her ancestors’ sins. Drawing strength from her grandmother, the author debunks many -isms around her and believes in fighting these same fights again and again, along with new ones. Knowing Vietnam and America like the palm and dorsal sides of her hand, the author brings home the multiple perspectives of the world around her in Why Do You Look at Me and See a Girl? She offers one way of navigating this world.
Order your copy to support Anvi in her writing and to support Vietnamese American authors.
Take Flight at Newkirk Alumni Center
A site-specific public installation dedicated to those who have found nourishment upon this fertile ground Collection of Newkirk Alumni Center, 450 Alumni Court, Irvine, CA 92697
I've had the privilege of spending time wandering through UC Irvine campus, collecting historical narratives, natural materials, and inspiration for a site-specific installation at the Newkirk Alumni Center. After months of paint-stained fingernails and camping up in the growing eucalyptus canopy mural on 20-foot scaffolding, I witnessed this inspirational research/art project come to fruition. There few things that I cherish in life more than falling in love with the artwork during its creation.
Take Flight is in the permanent collection of Newkirk Alumni Center and is available on view.
Thank you, Barney Ellis-Perry, for inviting me to help tell her story, to the Newkirk staff for welcoming me into your nest, and to all the people who helped make it possible for me to bring the outside inside, and replant some of UCI's rich history within these walls. Watch the development of the installation (and my first mural) !
still from honoring life: the work of trinh mai
Honoring Life: The Work of Trinh Mai Film Screenings
I had the privilege to have had my work documented by The Artist Odyssey (TAO) as a Season 1 guest. Coupled with the desire to share artists' inspirations, methods, and modes of thinking with the motivation to support arts in education, The Artist Odyssey is a global network that strives to bring the community together through art. Thank you for supporting the arts!
Honoring Life: The Work of Trinh Mai will be screening at the following institutions, followed by an artist talk and Q&R :
Winter 2023
November 3, 2022
March 2022
October 7, 2020
May 20, 2019
April 11, 2019
April 1-5, 2019
February 10, 2019
February 13, 2019
May 1, 2018
March 10, 2018
February 21, 2018
November 9, 2017
November 6, 2017
August 31, 2017
March 18, 2017
February 21, 2017
February 8, 2017
January 25, 2017
November 29, 2016
November 10, 2016
September 1, 2016
June 2, 2016
April 15, 2016
December 4, 2015
April 18, 2015
Fort Worth Contemporary Art, Fort Worth, TX
Stanford University, Stanford, CA
Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams, MA
Windward School, Los Angeles, CA
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
University of Washington, Seattle, WA
San Diego Art Institute, San Diego, CA
Euphrat Museum of Art, Cupertino, CA
University of California, Irvine
Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR
Coastline Art Gallery, Newport Beach, CA
MiraCosta College, Oceanside, CA
California State University, Fullerton
Oceanside Museum of Art, Oceanside, CA
Pasadena Central Library, Pasadena, CA
University of California, Los Angeles
Oceanside Museum of Art, Oceanside, CA
University of California, San Diego
University of California, Los Angeles
University of California, Irvine
California State University, Los Angeles
University of California, Irvine
Viet Film Festival, Orange, CA (Recipient of Audience Choice Award)
The Artist Odyssey Studios, Encinitas, CA
The Artists’ Grief Deck
Produced by the Artists’ Literacies Institute, 601 W 26th St, New York, NY 10001 In partnership with: New York City Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (NYCVOAD) National Hospice Cooperative (NHC), and Ohio’s Hospice Fall 2022: Princeton Architectural Press publishes second edition
I am pleased to share one of my works, What Is To Come, along with its accompanying statement, will be included in first edition of The Artists’ Grief Deck, a card deck tool kit that mobilizes artists and grief workers to help millions process loss in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Alongside 50 fellow artists, my painting will be printed on a card as part of a deck that will be distributed to NYCVAOD’s national partners for use in supporting grief processing in isolation, with the hope of bringing comfort to those who have lost loved ones.
To date, this project has been sent out to 10 countries on 4 continents, as well as to 40 US states, and also Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia.
Learn more about this beautiful project
Purchase your own Artists’ Grief Deck in English or en Español