Shipping Forecast South China Sea, 11th June 2017

‘Coral Sea As Rolling Thunder’ (2017) installation for Art Basel Statements traces how rapid economic growth, communication and exchange alters subjecthood in contemporary Vietnam.

Tieu has further shot a series of photographs in response to the environmental incident, which occurred in 2016, when Formosa Plastics Group released toxic chemicals into the ocean, where Tieu during this time shot her video work. Across the installation – ranging from the three photographs Inhale, Exhale, Inhale Again (all 2017) hung on melted aluminium bars and a LED sculpture installation – Tieu expands on the exploration of the fragility of the body, singling out details of the daily exposure to pollution. The sculptural LED work shows the marine weather forecasts for the South China Sea, an area in front of the Vietnamese coastline that is currently claimed by China and where Formosa’s toxic spill occurred. In these weather forecasts Tieu investigates unforeseeable influences causing humans and environments to adapt, alter and self-repair. Underpinning the installation, the modified aluminium structure, reminiscent of this observation, references architectural design and the organic body equally, thus pointing out the interactions and crossing lines between corporate and individual responsibility, private and public sectors.

Right Fiction – Hư Cấu Đúng

This artwork is a joint piece by two artists Ngoc Nau and Phan Thao Nguyen for ‘Right Fiction’ – a duo exhibition where the audience is led through a maze of fiction and non-fiction. These artists mingle scientific knowledge and assumed fact into imaginative and experimental storytelling. However, each of them constructs their narrative differently: Ngọc Nâu uses fictionality – the process of fabricating fact in order to distract our acceptance of reality and thus our perception of the sciences; whereas Thảo Nguyên utilizes fictional, near dream-like tales to distance herself from historic assumptions.

Light Portrait

Fascinated by science, these artworks are results of Ngọc Nâu’s understanding of light, from the perspective of physics, chemistry, astronomy, philosophy and psychology. Her ‘light’-searching journey reaches a climax in the photographic light-box ‘Light portrait’, where thousands of stars shine through punctuated holes, as if her soul is undergoing perpetual enlightenment.

Right fiction

This artwork is a joint piece by two artists Ngoc Nau and Phan Thao Nguyen for ‘Right Fiction’ – a duo exhibition where the audience is led through a maze of fiction and non-fiction. These artists mingle scientific knowledge and assumed fact into imaginative and experimental storytelling. However, each of them constructs their narrative differently: Ngọc Nâu uses fictionality – the process of fabricating fact in order to distract our acceptance of reality and thus our perception of the sciences; whereas Thảo Nguyên utilizes fictional, near dream-like tales to distance herself from historic assumptions.

Flowers

Flowers as found in ‘Where have all the flowers gone’ song listed as one of top 20 influencing political songs is a song by Pete Seeger. The song’s lyric is inspired by Mikhail Sholokhov’s novel The Quite Flows the Don and with the three lines of the songs from an Ukrainian folk song. ‘Where are the flowers, the girls have plucked them. Where are the girls, they’ve all taken husbands. Where are the men, they’re all in the army.’ The song is listed as anti-war song in the era of 1960s. With the compose of neon light of flowers writing in rose color, the work brings the mood of peaceful light to the existence of flowers while in the background, the music and the lyric of ‘Where have all the flowers gone?’ keeps repeatedly played asking the question of physical plus virtual concept of peace. (Tran Minh Duc)