Kim Sandara

Sandara is a queer, Laotian/Vietnamese, artist from Northern Virginia and now based in Brooklyn, NY. In 2016, she graduated from the Maryland Institute College of Art, with a BFA in General Fine Arts.

They’ve shown work at various DC community events. In 2019, the National Museum of Women in the Arts' gift shop collaborated with her to create an event "Being '' showcasing her work and guiding visitors to draw music. They have been featured in Visart's Gen 5 exhibition, the Torpedo Factory's 2019 Emerging Artists exhibition and the Washington Project for the Arts’ 2019 Auction Gala. In their Torpedo Factory summer 2019 Post-Grad Residency, they created a stop motion animation about their parent's immigration story intersecting her coming out story. They used the studio space as a shop to fundraise for local and national LGBTQ+ non profits empowering queer youth. In their 2020 Bresler Residency at VisArts, they focused more on Lao identity work.

They’re currently working on their graphic novel "Origins of Kin and Kang" about their coming out story and collaborating with Legacies of War to help fund removing the bombs left over from the Secret and Vietnam Wars from Laos. They are eager to integrate into creative, queer and Asian communities in Brooklyn.