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2008
Artist Tam Tran
Courtesy of the artist, Tam Tran
Moving to Memphis as a child with her family from Vietnam, Tam Tran studied journalism at the University of Memphis and currently works in the advertising field. Her interest in photography is a highly personal, primarily self-taught form of expression, with a few black and white photography classes at UM serving as her only formal training. In 2010, on the strength of an exhibition at the Power House art space in Downtown Memphis, she was selected for inclusion in the Whitney Biennial in New York, one of the most prestigious events in the contemporary art world, internationally. Featured in that exhibition was the Raising Hell series depicting her nephew playing soldier in a typical suburban backyard. He is outfitted for battle in pajamas and a bed sheet cape, a broomstick for a spear. Alternating episodes in the imaginary contest with his imaginary opponent are seen from different angles, making him seem powerful in one frame, vulnerable in the next, both a bold warrior and a little kid in the same being.
