Monsoon Melody
2019
Softcover, 224 pages, 16.5 × 24 cm
Published by Mousse Publishing, Milan
Edited by: Han Nefkens Foundation, Barcelona
Co-edited by: Marko Daniel, Director Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona; Dirk Snauwaert, Director WIELS, Brussels; Polly Staple, Director Chisenhale Gallery, London
Texts by: Pamela N. Corey, Zoë Gray, Han Nefkens, Thao Nguyen Phan, Sam I-shan, Hilde Teerlinck, Thomas D. Trummer
Designed by: Ok Kyung Yoon
In English
ISBN 978-88-6749-397-5
€ 18 / $ 20
Thao Nguyen Phan work builds a multi-layered, visual, thrilling and poetical body of work which goes beyond a purely historical or political point of view and explores current questions on food security and our ecological responsibility towards agricultural environments. Through different levels of narrative and speaking simultaneously of real and imaginary worlds, she proposes alternate versions of reality. Co-edited by Fundació Joan Miro, WIELS and Chisenhale Gallery with the support of Galerie Zink Waldkirchen, the publication Monsoon Melody features a large array of images (watercolors and stills from her films) and texts that provide a broad overview of Thao Nguyen Phan’s latest work. In addition to an interview with the artist by Hilde Teerlinck (curator and CEO of the Han Nefkens Foundation) and a contribution by Han Nefkens (writer, art collector, and founder of the Han Nefkens Foundation), the book contains the films’ subtitles as well as a collection of essays: Thomas D. Trummer (director of Kunsthaus Bregenz) explores the meeting of poetry and politics in Phan’s films; Pamela N. Corey (lecturer in South East Asian Art at SOAS University of London) discusses the narrative strategies used to produce alternative histories; and Zoë Gray (senior curator at WIELS, Brussels) looks into play as a way of delving into serious social, political, and cultural issues. An excerpt from a curatorial essay by Sam I-Shan comments upon the film Tropical Siesta, while Phan provides insight into Mute Grain and Becoming Alluvium. The book ends with a poetic appendix written by Lila Matsumoto.
Purchase here:
https://www.wiels.org/fr/bookshop/catalogue/monsoon-melody
https://www.moussepublishing.com/?product=/thao-nguyen-phan-monsoon-melody/
Voyages de Rhodes artist book
NTU CCA Singapore–Artist’s Book Series
Edited by Ute Meta Bauer and Anca Rujoiu
Designed by mono.studio
This publication is published and commissioned by NTU CCA Singapore–Artist’s Book Series, 2018
Distributed by Select Books
15.5 x 23.5 cm, 384 pages, 160 watercolour drawings, softcover
With a folded map insert, 18.5 x 23.5 cm
ISBN: 978-981-11-8676-9
SGD 58.00
Purchase here:
https://theartling.com/en/book/thao-nguyen-phan-voyages-de-rhodes/
NTU CCA Singapore is proud to present the latest publication of its Artist’s Book Series, Voyages de Rhodes by former Artist-in-Residence Thảo Nguyên Phan (Vietnam). Published and commissioned by the Centre, Voyages de Rhodes re-assembles into a book format watercolour drawings painted directly by the artist on the pages of a found publication. The artist used as her canvas a book by French Jesuit missionary Alexandre de Rhodes (1591–1660) that describes his travel experiences and observations, including in the region of present-day Vietnam, during the 17th century*.
Phan’s interventions in the book interweave different narratives that sit at the border between realism and fantasy. Reflecting upon the problematic agrarian reforms in post-war Vietnam that led to the redistribution of land and collective farming, Phan’s drawings depict children in the foreground as protagonists of an imagined commune where play or state of inertia become tools of defiance and escape. Juxtaposing 17th-century travel literature with contemporary images, Phan’s works produce a palimpsest of Vietnam’s history with layers of voices from the present and the past.
The artist started the project Voyages de Rhodesin 2014 and the drawings were first exhibited in a solo exhibition Poetic Amnesia (2017) curated by Zoe Butt at The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
In the process of assembling the drawings back into the codex form, the project Voyages de Rhodes turned into artist’s book, whereby the book format is an artistic medium and subject of investigation. Voyages de Rhodes highlights that a book remains inherently open-ended despite its strive for completeness, and is prone to processes of erasure, ongoing interpretation, and new associations.
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*Voyages et Mission du Père Alexandre de Rhodes, S. J., en la Chine et autres royaumes de l’Orient, avec son retour end Europe par la Perse et l’Arménie, Lille, 1884. First edition published in 1653 in Paris. In English: The Travels and Missions of Father Alexander de Rhodes, S.J., in China and other Kingdoms of the Orient, with a retour in Persia and Armenia, transl. by Solange Hertz, 1966.
More details on Voyages de Rhodes by Thảo Nguyên Phan can be found on ntucca website: http://ntu.ccasingapore.org/publications/thao-nguyen-phan-voyages-de-rhodes/
Poetic Amnesia exhibition catalogue
With curatorial essay by Zoe Butt and artistic response by Joan Jonas
in English and Vietnamese
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
15 x 20 cm, 120 pages, softcover
Limited edition of 200 copies
22 USD / 500.000 VND
Available to purchase at
The Factory Contemporary Art Centre
15 Nguyen U Di, Thao Dien Ward, Dist 2, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
info@factoryartscentre.com
