This Artist’s 2014 Paintings Perfectly Envisage The Pandemic Lockdown

Thuy Van Vu’s empty classrooms feel eerily familiar right now, almost photographic. “The spaces she portrays are vast and full of potential, and also of a great, yawning absence. Where are the children? Their teachers? The chairs are piled awkwardly on top of the desks, everything pushed together, as if those who left were in a rush. There’s a sense that these desks and chairs have been lingering and might never be used again.” – Catapult