ARTIST STATEMENT
In this series, I honor the legacy of my grandmother, Somchit Pinudom Vuntangboon, who was born in 1941 in Bangkok, Thailand, and left her homeland in 1981 to escape an abusive arranged marriage. Her journey reflects a lineage of resilience—women in my family who have sought refuge and reinvention amidst cycles of hardship. Each image captures a moment of stillness, taken in December 2023, just six months before my yai’s (grandmother’s) passing. These photographs, framed by the familiar warmth and textures of her trailer home in Flint, Texas, evoke both intimacy and distance. Through my mother and grandmother’s stories of self-reliance and refuge from the past, I explore the painful yet profound connections between our experiences. Reflecting on the legacies of abuse and the patterns of seeking solace in American partners, my work acknowledges the weight of silence and the power of ancestral voices– revealing both what is lost and what can be reclaimed through connection to spirit and lineage.
ARTIST BIO
Tarik Vuntangboon Bartel (they/them) is a Thai-American artist whose work explores embodiment and liberation in relationship to constructions of queerness, diaspora, and community. Bartel is a self taught photographer, an award-winning documentary filmmaker, and a spoken word poet. Their photography seeks to engage and disrupt conceptions of identity, culture, and family. Bartel has worked as a teaching artist, youth worker, and cultural organizer since 2014. Their work has been exhibited at the International Center of Photography in New York, Pao Arts Center, Spaceus, Trustman Gallery, the walls of friends’ homes, in empty lots in Chinatown, on brick walls and giant wood blocks, in books, bookstores, and on dinner plates.