Jam
es Dinh Resumé
12723 Park Street
Cer
ritos, CA 90703
562.841.2512
[email protected]
www.studiofolia.com
EDUC
ATION
2002 Master of Landscape Architecture
Un
iversity of California, Berkeley
1997 Master of Public Health, with a concentration in epidemiology University of California, Los Angeles
1991 Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences
University of California, Irvine
WORK EXPERIENCE
2010 – present Principal
St
udiofolia, Cerritos, CA
2006 – present Design Consultant
Orange Street Studio, Landscape Architecture, Los Angeles, CA 2019 – present Design Consultant
SALT, Landscape Architecture, Los Angeles, CA
PUBL
IC ART COMMISSIONS
2023
Kahului Community Park mural, Maui, HI – currently in design development with Thinh Nguyen Willie Henderson Sports Complex public art, San Diego, CA – currently in design development 50th Anniversary sculpture, Cedar Park, TX – currently in fabrication Baltimore County COVID-19 Memorial, Baltimore, MD – currently in fabrication Vista Canyon Multi-Modal Center public art, Santa Clarita, CA – completed Woman's College tribute, Uni. of N. Carolina, Greensboro – completed with Michael Stutz Commemorative public art, Frankfort, KY – completed
Sports Park mural, Tustin, CA – completed
2022 St. Thomas University student memorial, St. Paul, MN – completed University of Nebraska public art, Lincoln, NE – completed Westminster Crossing affordable housing art, Westminster, CA – completed with Thinh Nguyen 2021 Evergreen Cemetery Veterans Memorial, Gainesville, FL – completed Montgomery County Law Enforcement Memorial, Dayton, OH – currently in design development 202
0 Equity Fountain public art, Helena, MT – completed with Michael Stutz 2019 Higuera Adobe public art, Milpitas, CA – commissioned artist 2018 Art in Transit Program, bus shelter public art, San Antonio, TX – completed National Native American Veterans Memorial, Smithsonian, Washington D.C. – finalist 2017 Of Two Lineages public art, Westminster, CA – completed 2016 David & Margaret Youth and Family Services Public Art, La Verne, CA – completed Attachment 12
201
5 LA County Sheriff’s Memorial, LA County Arts Commission – commissioned artist 2014 Circles of a Ripple public art, Hacienda Heights Community Center– completed
EXHIBITIONS & WORKSHOPS
2018
Viet Stories: Recollections & Regenerations , Richard Nixon Library, Yorba Linda, CA Exhibition designer
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7 Impress (exhibition of contemporary printmaking), Orange County Center for Contemporary Art Participating artist
2016 Coastal Communities Cancer Center Temporary public art, Ventura, CA Commissioned artist
2015 Earth Day Temporary Public Art Installation, City of Garden Grove, CA Commissioned artist
Forty Hues Between Black & White, Orange County Center for Contemporary Art Participating artist for community printmaking workshop Re:Imagine Garden Grove, Garden Grove, CA
Participating artist for community art workshop
Vietnamese Focus: Generations of Stories , Old Santa Ana Courthouse, Santa Ana, CA Exhibition director and designer
2014 Re:Imagine Garden Grove, Garden Grove, CA
Participating artist for community art workshop
2012 Noche de Altares, Santa Ana, CA
Participating artist for community art workshop
2010 Thanatopolis Exhibition, I-Park Foundation, East Haddam, CT Land arts paper project
2010 Juried All-Media Exhibition, Palos Verdes Art Center, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA Ceramic sculpture
2009 & 2010 Student Art Exhibition, Cerritos College Art Gallery, Cerritos, CA Ceramic sculpture
AWARDS
2019 Orange County Arts Awards Honoree: Achievement Aw
ard for Arts Leader
2017 American for the Arts Convention Scholarship
2006 Post-Katrina New Orleans East Design Residency, New Orleans, LA Attachment 12
Image List
Image 1, 2, 3
Tit
le T.I.E. (Transformation, Illumination, Effort)
Year 2022
Location College of Education, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE Medium Painted steel
Dimensions 20' high x 14' diameter
Budget $100,150
Client University of Nebraska
Located in front of the new College of Education, the sculpture encapsulates ideas that are often associated with learning and education, namely transformation, illumination, and effort. To create a three-dimensional artwork that embodies the process of change and growth, a flat plane is conceptually cut and folded. As light is a universal metaphor for the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge, both sunlight and night-time illumination are incorporated into the artwork. Depending on the time of day and how sunlight hits the sculpture, the resulting light and shadow patterns created by the circular perforations on the sculpture change throughout the day. The design also creates a welcoming gathering space that is inspiring and joyful.
Ima
ge 4, 5
Title Of Two Lineages
Year 2017
Location City of Westminster, CA
Dimensions Sculpture 18’ high x 3’ wide, plaza 35’ x 35’ Medium Steel, powder-coated aluminum panels, concrete, landscape Budget $200,000
Client Vietnamese American Cultural Alliance
Located in the heart of the largest Vietnamese community in the U.S., the artwork is a contemporary re-telling of a traditional Vietnamese origins legend. The artwork conveys the hopeful story of the building of a new community from the tragedies of war. At night the sculpture is illuminated from within like a lantern, symbolizing the resiliency and hopes of the community. Surrounding the central sculpture are benches that showcase 100 portraits of everyday Vietnamese Americans, a collaborative project with the Vietnamese American Oral History Project of the University of California, Irvine.
Image 6, 7
Title Equity Fountain
Year 2020
Location Helena, MT
Medium Granite and stainless steel sculpture
Dimensions 7' high x 6' wide x 6' long
Budget $80,000
Client Equity Fountain Committee
After ascending three steps, visitors enter a welcoming space surrounded by trees. Their eyes are captivated by a glimmering sphere that seemingly floats above the rippling water of a granite millstone fountain. Words in English and Native Chippewa language are "woven" into the sphere, to remind the community that we must be steadfast like a turning millstone in ensuring that society is guided by values that unite us as opposed to divide us. The Chippewa words represent the Teachings of the Seven Grandfathers, a value system present in many Native Attachment 12
American cultures. The artwork replaced a fountain that had been installed by a chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy in 1916. The project was a collaboration with sculptor Michael Stutz.
Image 8
Title Daisy Garland
Collaborator Michael Stutz
Year 2023
Location University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Medium Bronze, brick, powder-coated aluminum panels, landscape Dimensions 7' high x 43' diameter
Budget $170,000
Client University of North Carolina
The artwork pays tribute to the years when the school was known as the Woman's College. The graduation tradition of the stitching together a garland made of real daisy flowers—the Daisy Chain—was one of the school’s earliest customs. The project creates a community space that— like the Daisy Chain—connects the past to the present and future and people to place. The tribute has two main elements: the “garland walls” and a central sculpture. As three seating elements that create a circular space, the “garland walls” visually connect people to the legacy of the past through historic photographs and also to each other. Similar to how the College played a transformative role in changing the lives of women, the narrative of the “garland walls” is metaphorically transformed into a sculpture of a woman’s face--Astera. The sculpture is the embodiment of the aspirations of all the women who passed through the educational halls of the Woman’s College. “Woven” from strips of bronze, the sculpture references Greensboro’s once- prominent textile industry and was fabricated by sculptor Michael Stutz.
Image 9, 10
Title Memorial to Deceased Students
Year 2022
Location University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, MN
Medium Granite and cast glass
Dimensions 8' high x 5' diameter
Budget $60,000
Client University of St. Thomas
Four stone panels intersect to form a cruciform, symbolizing the earth and the corporeal body.
In contradistinction, glass discs inset into the stone panels evoke an ephemeral lightness with their translucency. Their circular form symbolizes the heart and the eternal soul. Both loss and renewal are made visible through with this void that captures light. The gradient of materials— from rough to smooth—creates a sense of revealing.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART For behind all seen things lies something vaster;
everything is but a path, a portal, or a window
opening on something more than itself.
— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART Equity Fountain
Helena, Montana
T.I.E. (Transformation Illumination Effort)
College of Education, Uni. of Nebraska, Lincoln
Of Two Lineages
Westminster, California
Daisy Garland
Uni. of North Carolina at Greensboro
1 Introduction
Based in the Los Angeles area, James Dinh founded the
design practice Studiofolia in 2010 with the simple mission of connecting people to memory and place through public art.
Because the context and requirements of each project are different, his design process is based on an approach rather than a replicable style. This focus on site-specificity is reflected in the diversity of built projects located in different communities across the country. James believes that the most enduring and grounded designs result when there is room for different voices to be heard.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART 2 Inspiration
The proposed artwork for Sunnyvale’s Lakewood Library and Learning Center is inspired the idea that libraries are literal and metaphorical portals that open onto vast worlds of information, knowledge, and resources.
They are democratic spaces that “open” one’s minds to the wonders of the world.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART 3 Design - the Portal
Based on the idea that libraries are portals, the proposed sculpture takes the form of a sun- or moon-shaped gateway that visitors can walk through on their way to or from the library’s entrance.
The portal is “woven” from ribbons of steel, like a basket. This “weaving” serves as a metaphor for the interconnectedness of communities and humanity.
The portal’s size will be wide so that it is handicap accessible. The lower portion of the two “legs” of the sculpture will be solid to deter climbing. •
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART Design - the Portal
Some of the ribbons would have cutout texts, representing the titles of classic literary works from around the world. If possible, the titles would be written in their original language to capture the beautiful diversity of human languages in the world and in Sunnyvale.
The artist will work with library staff to compile a list of the world’s great literary classics. The list should be inclusive and have broad appeal for children and adults.
The weaving together of texts further reinforces the idea of the interconnectedness and richness of the world’s shared humanity and cultures.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART 5 Night View
The sculpture will cast interesting shadow and light patterns over the course of the day.
As the sculpture is hollow, it will be illuminated from within and glow like a lantern at night.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART Elevation Views
SCALE: 3/4” = 1’
0 1 ft
6 ~11 ft
~12 ft
~7.5 ft
~3 ft
FRONT/BACK ELEVATION SIDE ELEVATION
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART 7 N
SCALE: 1” = 10’
0 10 ft
EXIT ENTRANCE
ARTWORK
Site Plan
As shown, the prefered location
is towards the front of the entry
courtyard, where people can
engage with the artwork as they
enter and exit.
That being said, the artist will
work with the design team
to find the most appropriate
location for the artwork.
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART 9 Materials
Sculpture
3/8” thick steel for base and framework
1/8” steel for “woven” parts
A combination of water-jet cut pattern and welded “weaving” Powder-coat paint
Color to be determined
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Lighting
LED strip light
Attached to inside seam of circular frame
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Installation
Sculpture will be fabricated as a single unit to facilitate shipping & installation A small crane might be needed to lift the sculpture to the site Base plates attached to “legs” of sculpture to be bolted to concrete footing •
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LAKEWOOD LIBRARY AND LEARNING CENTER - EXTERIOR PUBLIC ART For Behind All Seen Things Lies Something Vaster
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