When Tram Colwin moved with her family from Vietnam to the United States, she was seven. Two years earlier, the communist government had destroyed her family’s home. In 1994, Tram, her parents, and her two siblings left, and the seven-year-old had to painstakingly limit the items she could take with her, leaving the rest behind.
That’s the inspiration for the upcoming art exhibition “What We Carry” at The Medium in Springdale. She’s collaborating with Stephen Ironside at Iron Lotus Creative and Canopy NWA to tell the stories of others who have left one home for another in northwest Arkansas. The exhibition includes her watercolor paintings of items people carried with them. She received an Artists 360 grant, a program of the Mid-America Arts Alliance, with funding support from the Walton Family Foundation. She calls “What We Carry” a dream project.
