Curated Exhibition with Yoonmi Nam and Ruben Castillo:
The Soft Edges
About the Artist
sTo Len is an interdisciplinary artist whose recent work has centered on collaborations
with abused landscapes and municipal agencies. The cross-disciplinary nature of Len’s work has included printmaking with polluted waterways, 3D scanning Fresh Kills landfill, recycling waste into art materials, and hosting performances at Superfund sites. He has been the Public Artist in Residence at the Department of Sanitation in NY and the first artist in residence at AlexRenew Wastewater Treatment Facility in Virginia.
Len is based in Queens, NY with familial roots in Vietnam and Virginia, and his work
incorporates these bonds by connecting issues of their history, environment, traditions and politics.
Artist Statement
My ethos as an artist embodies an in-the-field practice that deconstructs the job of an artist with a collaborative, holistic, and community-minded approach that blends civic stewardship with playful investigations. I believe that art can provide liberating and unconventional ways to examine the world around us and illuminate the issues that are often hiding in the shadows. I am invested in planting wild, regenerative seeds into the city’s consciousness through my work to try and unlock the civic imagination and create work that is accessible to a diverse audience while still being provocative, poetic and profound.
Artist
Exhibition
The Soft Edges
River Scroll (for Frenchtown)
Gomitaku on canvas, sumi ink, india ink, found objects
Picked by volunteer coastal clean up crew
5’ x 30’
2022
Future of A Material (F.OA.M.)
Gomitaku installation
2020
Linen, canvas, sumi ink, found coastal debris
Joseloff Gallery, University of Hartford, CT
Future of A Material (F.OA.M.)
Gomitaku installation
2020
Linen, canvas, sumi ink, found coastal debris
Joseloff Gallery, University of Hartford, CT
Accumulated Talisman
Gomitaku print on found fabric
17” x 25”
2020
Coastal Clean Up with New Haven Climate Movement, Save the Sound, and COASTS Debris for gomitaku collected along the Long Island Sound, New Haven, CT, 2022.
In conjunction with University of Connecticut and the exhibition To Dissolve into the Hydrocommons.
Tsunaminagashi printing with the Newtown Creek, Queens, NY
Photo by Walter Wlodarczyk 2019
Tsunaminagashi printing with the Newtown Creek, Queens, NY
Photo courtesy of the artist
2019
Flushing Meadows, (Corona Park ) #2, March 8th 2016
Pollution and detritus on paper
23.5” x 31.5”
Newtown Creek Center for Visual Research
A site-specific intervention near the waterfront.
The “Center” became Len’s studio and a public venue for water-themed performances and exhibits
2017-2019
May 30th, (Newtown Creek, Queens,NY)
Creek water, pollutants and detritus on paper
19” x 25″
2017
Sông Sài Gòn no. 1-6
Pollution and detritus on paper
29” x 36”
2017
Vin Gallery, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
These pieces were created on the Saigon River in 2017.
Looking for prints on the Flushing Creek, Queens, NY
2017