The Nguyễn Art Foundation is proud to present People, Victory and Life after the War , an art exhibition showcasing war sketches and contemporary artworks from its collection. The exhibition is the first public showing of the collection and marks the opening of two dedicated Art Spaces, an initiative of the Nguyễn Art Foundation in partnership with the EMASI Schools.

Curated by Gridthiya Gaweewong and students from Renaissance International School, EMASI International School, Nam Long and Van Phuc Campus, the exhibition aimed to use the curatorial process and exhibition-making as educational tools to engage students participation and ultimately enhance the art appreciation and visual experience. A secondary objective was to work with the collection as a way to encourage students to learn about Vietnam’s art history in association with its social and political context.

Students were encouraged to select the works from the Nguyễn Art collection, rationalize their choices and group them together through online meetings and a workshop. Based on this experiment, the exhibition slowly took shape. Its title was inspired by one of the students who encapsulated the sentiments of younger generations towards Vietnamese socio-political history.

Questions raised during the process include how historical artists reflected on their own artworks in today’s context, and how young contemporary artists perceived the memories of the war and, most importantly, how students and the young generation relate to this part of history. The curator collaborated with students, art teachers and the staff to stage the exhibition online during Covid–19.

People, Victory and Life after the War focuses on the past, present and imagined future of Vietnamese artistic practices and was constructed in two chapters, hosted simultaneously at EMASI Nam Long and Van Phuc campus throughout the 2021 school calendar.

The first chapter focuses directly on the American war memory and experiences, with close-up perspectives rendered in war sketches by Army artists and contemporary works by young artists from Vietnam and beyond. The second chapter focuses on war sketches of people, daily lives in the war zone and landscapes juxtaposed with works by contemporary artists who dealt with their distant, abstract and spatial memories about the war experience and its remnants. Both chapters demonstrate the interplay of reflexive memory which slowly shifted from the close-up to lonter shot and panoramic views that both manifest transgeneration of artists perception, imagination and sub-consciousness in a border context.

The two-chapter exhibition attempts to establish a dialog among trans-generations of artists, art lovers and students and features 24 artists with more than 100 historical war drawings and contemporary art from the Nguyễn Art Foundation Collection.

The exhibition will be on view from March 2021 to April 2022.

Special thanks to the participant students, art teachers, MoT+++ team and to the Post Vidai Collection.

Chapter #1: Bang Nhat Linh, Chu Thao, Dinh Q. Le, Laurent Weyl, Le Quy Tong, Nguyen Huy An, Nguyen Quoc Chanh, Pham Thanh Tam, The Propeller Group, Tram Carin Luong, Truong Cong Tung, Vo An Khanh, and Vuong Duy Khoai

Chapter #2: Bui Duy Khanh, Cian Duggan, Doan Hoang Lam, Do Thi Ninh, Ha Ninh Pham, Le Quoc Thanh, Le Quy Tong, Nguyen Phuong Linh, Nguyen Van Cuong, Pham Thanh Tam, Thao Nguyen Phan, Tuan Mami, Truong Hieu, and Tuyp Tran

Vo An Khanh (1936–2023, Vietnam), born in Ninh Quoi, in Bac Lieu Province, is most well-known for his striking black and white photographs of the American-Vietnam War, and their testament to human resilience. During the 1960s and early 1970s, he traveled with a guerrilla unit to document the front line of the Vietnamese resistance against the US in the Ca Mau region. He also managed the Photography Department of the local revolutionary cause and documented events related to frontline music and dance events. Between the years 1962 and 1975, Vo An Khanh staged a photographic exhibition in the exceptionally challenging condition of mangrove forests. His two well-known photographs, Mobile Military Medical Clinic and Extra-curriculum Political Science Class, were included in this traveling show, which he himself developed on the spot using natural light.
Vo An Khanh’s photographs have been included in the exhibition Another Vietnam: Pictures of the War from the Other Side in 2002 (co-organized by the International Centre for Photography, New York) and various other international and local exhibitions and publications, including Is it morning for you yet?, the 58th Carnegie International, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA, USA, 2022–2023; Living Pictures: Photography in Southeast Asia, National Gallery Singapore, Singapore, 2022–2023; People, Victory, and Life after the War, Nguyen Art Foundation, HCMC, Vietnam, 2021–2022; Masked Force, San Art, HCMC, Vietnam, 2020; and Time of others, Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia, 2016.