Hataya Tubtim ‘10 is fascinated by the spaces people inhabit and how spontaneous empathy arises across difference. 

Her practice originated in the studio with drawing, design, and painting, but she came to Otis to explore work that focuses on community engagement and public issues. Her experience in the first year project—nine-months in a small farming town in the San Joaquin Valley—was formative. Relating this to her parent’s legacy in rural Southeast Asia, she started to examine how traditional processes—including her inherited Thai culture—might draw people into a relationship with her work.
 

After graduating for the MFA Public Practice program, Hataya returned to the San Joaquin Valley with fellow student and collaborator, Michelle Glass. They received a commission to do a short community project in southern Kern County in 2012. Afterward, she wrote a proposal that funded their current project there entitled: 1000 Wildflowers and the Women of Arvin. 

Hataya has received grants from the Arts Council of Kern County, Pasadena Art’s Council, the Samsung Endowment, and a commission from the Pasadena Playhouse. Hataya and Glass produced an installation at the Armory Center for the Arts in 2013, and exhibitions of 1000 Wildflowers are scheduled in Bakersfield and in Los Angeles in 2016.