Binh Danh is an American

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

known for chlorophyll prints and daguerreotypes on the subjects of war, immigration, and National Parks.

Life and Work

Danh was born in Viet Nam in 1977. He immigrated with his parents to the United States in 1979. Danh has a BFA in Photography from San Jose State University, and MFA from Stanford University. At the age of 25, Danh was one of the youngest artists to be invited into

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admini ...

program.

Work

Danh's early work focuses predominately on the Vietnam War era and he has been quoted as saying that a lot of his work is involved with the theme of death. Danh has also said that the photographs he uses "bring up and start to fabricate memories" of his life in Vietnam. His images were described as being able to "summon up revulsion over present violent conflicts in the world without direct topical reference" and a critic said that his images of war scenes " evoked wars past and present with an unforced economy almost unparalleled in political art." He began a series of daguerreotypes of American National Parks in 2012. Cheryl Haines Gallery states that these images are "an attempt to negotiate his connection as a Vietnamese American with the landscape and history of the United States." and "He explains, “I am interested in how we as a nation of immigrants could ‘reflect’ on these daguerreotypes and see our faces in this landscape.” The highly reflective surfaces of Danh's daguerreotypes literally mirror their surroundings, embracing viewers within the idyllic environs of this national landmark."

Chlorophyll prints

Danh uses a specific

organic Organic may refer to: * Organic, of or relating to an organism, a living entity * Organic, of or relating to an anatomical organ Chemistry * Organic matter, matter that has come from a once-living organism, is capable of decay or is the product ...

technique of his own invention to create his art, the style of which is referred as

chlorophyll Chlorophyll (also chlorophyl) is any of several related green pigments found in cyanobacteria and in the chloroplasts of algae and plants. Its name is derived from the Greek words , ("pale green") and , ("leaf"). Chlorophyll allow plants to a ...

print. This process begins with choosing a suitable leaf; Danh prefers to use leaves from his mother's garden. Positives of photographs are placed onto leaves, and then covered with glass to be exposed to sunlight for a period of days. If Danh is satisfied with the finished piece, it will be encapsulated permanently by being cast in a solid block of resin. Danh has articulated that throughout his education he has been "very attracted to art, history, and science" and that the processes used in his work represent his "interest in the sciences and photographic techniques." Danh has also stated that the history he searches for "are the hidden stories embedded in the landscape around" him that chlorophyll prints "capture his belief in the interconnectedness of the natural world."

Notable works

''"Life: Dead"'', a series of framed, withered leaves imprinted with images of dead soldiers, was created using photographs of American soldiers who died between May 28 and June 3, 1969, the images of which were taken from an issue of '' Life'' magazine titled "One Week's Dead", and then were digitally rendered into a negative print. To create "Searching for the Cosmos", Danh used images downloaded from the Internet of the night sky, the negative of which were overlaid on individual leaves. The shadows of the negatives meant that the leaves were deprived of light. On one particular veined, almond-shaped leaf, named "Night Sky", this interruption in photosynthesis resulted in an image that was described as being "like the starry heavens." To accompany an ''

ofrenda An ''ofrenda'' (Spanish: " offering") is the offering placed in a home altar during the annual and traditionally Mexican ''Día de los Muertos'' celebration. An ''ofrenda'', which may be quite large and elaborate, is usually created by the fam ...

'', or offering, he produced for the Oakland Museum show in 2003, which combined photographs of the dead, candles, incense and a statue of the Buddha. Danh commented on his own culture's observance of death, "I come from a Vietnamese Buddhist background, so in my house there are many altars dedicated to many deceased relatives."

Solo exhibitions

*2004 – ''Human / Nature'' at the Haines Gallery, San Francisco, CA *2005 – ''Binh Danh's Photographic Works'', Mohr Gallery, Finn Center, Community School of Arts & Music, Mountain View, CA *2006 – ''Ancestral Altars'', Haines Gallery, San Francisco, CA *2007 – ''Botanical Stories'' Sanchez Art Center, Pacifica, CA *2007 – ''One Week's Dead'', Light Work, Syracuse, New York *2007 – ''Jungle of Memories'', Chico State University, Chico, CA *2007 – ''The Botany of Tuol Sleng'' at the Lisa Sette Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ *2008 – ''Life, Times, and Matter of the Swamp'' at the Mary Elizabeth Dee Shaw Gallery, Weber State University, Ogden, UT *2008 – ''Life: Dead'' at the Clara Hatton Gallery, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO *2009 – ''In the Eclipse of Angkor'' at the Lisa Sette Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ *2009 – ''In the Eclipse of Angkor'' at the Eleanor D. Wilson Museum, Hollins University, Roanoke, VA *2010 – ''Memory to Memory'' at the Lisa Sette Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ *2010 – ''Binh Danh: Collecting Memories'' Mills College Art Museum, CA *2010 – ''Binh Danh: In the Eclipse of Angkor'' North Carolina Museum of Art *2016 Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY *2018 Louisiana State Museum, New Orleans, LA *2018 Phillips Museum of Art, Lancaster, PA

Collections

*Cantor Arts Center, Stanford Universisty, CA * Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. * George Eastman Museum, Rochester, NY * M.H. de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA *

Museum of Contemporary Photography The Museum of Contemporary Photography (MoCP) was founded in 1976 by Columbia College Chicago as the successor to the Chicago Center for Contemporary Photography. The museum houses a permanent collection as well as the Midwest Photographers Project ...

, Columbia College, Chicago, IL *

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 paintings and more than 450,000 works ...

, MA *

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

, Washington, D.C. *

North Carolina Museum of Art The North Carolina Museum of Art (NCMA) is an art museum in Raleigh, North Carolina. It opened in 1956 as the first major museum collection in the country to be formed by state legislation and funding. Since the initial 1947 appropriation that e ...

, Raleigh, NC * Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA *

Philadelphia Museum of Art The Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMoA) is an art museum originally chartered in 1876 for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. The main museum building was completed in 1928 on Fairmount, a hill located at the northwest end of the Benjamin Fr ...

, Philadelphia, PA *Rochester Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY * San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA * San Jose Museum of Art, CA * University of California, Santa Cruz’s Special Collection * Eleanor D. Wilson Museum, Hollins University, Roanoke, VA

Awards and distinctions

*1996 Bank of America Achievement Award in the Field of Fine Arts, Plaque Winner, San Jose, CA *1996 Montalvo Award of Merit, Villa Montalvo, CA *2000 Lottery Grant, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA *2001 Individual Grant, Belle Foundation, San Jose, CA *2004 Artist Project Award, The Center for Photographic Art, Carmel, CA *2007 Visions from the New California Award,

Alliance of Artists Communities The Alliance of Artists Communities is an international non-profit arts organization. Founded in 1991 following a pilot program and recommendation through the MacArthur Foundation, the organization is focused on advocacy, promotion, and cultiv ...

, Providence, RI *2012 8th Biennale of Sydney, Australia *2013 Sun Valley Center for the Arts, Artist Residency, Hailey, ID *2018 Lesley University, Artist Residency, Cambridge, MA *2019 Haines Gallery, Artist Residency, in Nevada City, CA

References

External links

Official WebsiteHaines GalleryLisa Sette GalleryKQED: SPARK: Binh Danh
{{DEFAULTSORT:Danh, Binh 1977 births Living people American photographers Artists from California Artists from the San Francisco Bay Area Artists from San Jose, California Photographers from California Photographers from San Francisco San Jose State University alumni Stanford University alumni Vietnamese emigrants to the United States