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Tran Truong’s paintings read like poems. At first glance we see images of roads, stop lights, a skirt, legs, the patterns made by window wipers on a car’s windshield, a blustery blue sky repeated three times. The diagrammatic black and white design of a tuxedo, or a pair of windowpanes. Floating stoplights in the black of night. These paintings resonate like after images. They seem to whisper of an intensely quiet and personal investigation of one’s own life. How many times have I myself stared out of my own cars windshield on an endless expanse of highway and noticed that same double half sphere made by the window wipers sweeping back and forth and thought “this is how the world looks”. When I notice these things, it is my way of making sense of the world. And so, it is when looking at these paintings. 

When I first saw the paintings of stoplights floating in the night sky they stopped me where I stood. I could imagine a pessimist read of that image. “Son, Life is a long road of stoplights”. But what I felt was something much larger and much keener than that. I’m not even sure how to put it into words. There is a gentleness to the treatment of the image. Like something fragile was being held very purposely and with great intent. Something about the beauty of repetition or looking for signs in a blinking city. 

Many nights I have looked at the moon in a similar way. The idea that the Greeks and the Romans as well as the Inuits and the tribes of Africa have looked upon this very same moon has stunned me. There is a stillness and universal reckoning that takes place be it the Sea of Tranquility on the lunar surface or a simple glowing stop light at the intersection of Sunset and Virgil. We are all having this very singular experience and are both alone and not alone. This is how I feel when I look at the work of Tran Truong.

--David Korty 

 

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Tran Truong received her BA from UCLA and MFA in Painting from Milton Avery School of the Arts at Bard College, NY. Her artwork has been shown in group exhibitions throughout Los Angeles, New York and the Bay Area. This is her second solo exhibition.She lives and works in Los Angeles, CA

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trantruong.net

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In the Queens flat file:

 

Drawings by Jesse Meltzer

 

Jesse Meltzer received his BFA from School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA 

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