About Dan Tran

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Tran was born in Vietnam, and now lives in the United States. He worked as a bioengineer for many years, and is a self-taught artist. Since 2009 he has painted in the abstract and naive style exploring our human condition.

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From 2009 to 2012, he painted the figurative series Icons, a series of pop portraits of world icons such as Gandhi, Muhammad Ali, Marilyn Monroe, the Dalai Lama, Jackson Pollock and Frida Kahlo.

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He followed with the series Legends & Myths in the pop/magical realism style, depicting today’s socio-political realities in his home country Vietnam through her myths and legends. He participated in several group and solo shows in the US and Germany. In 2013 the series Myths was shown at the National Museum of Fine Arts in Hanoi, Vietnam under the sponsorship of UNESCO. A number of works were deemed too subversive by the Vietnamese government, and consequently banned.

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Since 2014, he has explored a more universal abstract visual language. The content of his art however never strays far from a deep concern about the human condition. Thus the series Entanglement  of Opposites was born, which has been shown in the US (2016-2018) and Vietnam (2019)

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In 2020, he responded to covid and extreme political turmoil with the series Lost & Found in the Time of INfection, visioning the world in the eyes of a child, offering a fresh look at burning issues of the day (climate change, criminal justice, threats to democrarcy) as well as eternal human challenges (friendship, love, hope, healing.)