Rest in Power, Dinh Q. Lê.
Last month, the art world lost one of the most prominent Asian American artists of our time. Dinh Q. Lê (1968-2024) was a Vietnamese American artist known for his large woven photo collages. Lê was born in Ha Tien, Vietnam, near the Cambodian border. As a child, he learned to weave from an aunt who used the weaving technique to make grass mats. In his work, Lê used strips of photographs to make tapestry-like pieces that wove together images of Vietnam’s history with depictions of Vietnam in Western media and Hollywood films such as “Apocalypse Now.” Lê also worked in film and installation.
Growing up in Vietnam near the Cambodia border, Lê had traumatic memories of the Khmer Rouge Invasion. He and his family fled Vietnam in 1978 by boat, first spending a year in Thailand, then moving to the United States. Lê studied photography at UC Santa Barbara and went on to earn an MFA from the School of Visual Arts in New York. Lê eventually became a U.S. citizen, but never felt at home in the United States. He frequented Vietnam in the 1990s and eventually made his permanent home in Ho Chi Minh City.
