Yan Yan’s Story:

“I’ve always loved art since I was little.

I remember being a child, and playing house in front of my grandma’s porch in Myanmar with these medicine containers and little knickknacks, and being creative by incorporating what was available to me, and making it what I wanted. That’s been a root in my life, being able to adapt and utilize what’s around me to create something new.

Growing up being “mixed” ethnically and in a war torn country of Burma, I’ve realized that home for me is not defined by location. It’s defined by the people that surround me, my parents, and my friends. Since birth, my so-called “home” hasn’t been stationary, moving from Malaysia to Burma at the age of five months old, to moving back to Malaysia because my “home” was no longer a safe home for me, to being resettled in Vancouver, Washington by Lutheran Community Services NW, and now residing in Indianapolis, Indiana. Home for me is where I can be, and be at peace. It’s not something easily found, it’s something I have cultivated through understanding who I am and why I am the way I am.

I am an Artist. I am Queer. I am a Refugee. I am Burmese - both Chin and Shan. These are identities I have chosen myself but also were given to me by society.

I never thought I would have a job working in refugee resettlement and creating an arts-based nonprofit, LUMA Galleries. LUMA is an organization that Sophie Wang and I started together in 2021. Through that experience, we were able to showcase untold stories with a strong focus on advocacy and empowerment. I was able to not only be part of that journey of interviewing, collecting those contents, and creating themes, but I was also able to create a separate piece for the show itself, where I incorporated each of the seven Muses and their stories into a singular piece called, “One in All”.

I definitely want to continue sharing people’s stories, especially stories that are really hard to hear, as well as local refugee stories. Indianapolis has the biggest population of Burmese diaspora in the country. And the Burmese community in itself is so diverse, with 110+ official languages. In 2021, there was a military coup, and yes, the violence is a story in itself. But there are also people, individual people, that are still impacted and those stories haven’t been told.

We are all humans with our own needs and desires. Through my art, I’m hoping to create a world with more empathy and compassion. The complexity of humanity is the beauty in our stories, and in the last couple years, I’ve showcased a lot of them. I’m now at a point where I’m ready to showcase my own.”