Binh Pho
Binh Pho (September 19, 1955 – August 23, 2017) was a Vietnamese-American artist best known for his pierced and painted works in wood. Early life Binh Pho grew up in Saigon during the Vietnam War. His childhood memories are for the most part pleasant, though he remembered the horrors of the Tet Offensive and other fearful moments. When the “Red Peace” descended upon the land in 1975, he refused to accept Communism. He tried to escape but was captured and sent to a re-education camp for a year where he was brutally beaten and tortured by communist cadres. After three more attempts he finally made his escape in 1978 as one of the boat people. The journey from his childhood in Vietnam to life as an artist in the United States is one of struggle and perseverance, yet he viewed it as a philosophical acceptance of destiny through the lens of the happiness and success he found in the United States. Binh Pho arrived in the United States on May 7, 1979, and initially focused on higher education, receiving a bachelor's degree in electronics in 1982. He became a United States citizen in 1984. An early breakthrough in Pho's work