HCMC – Discussion “But is this photography?”

10 am – 12 pm, Sun 08 Jun 2014
Zerostation

From the organizer:

Come to the discussion “But is this photography?”. This event is to build up a platform/ forum for discussions about photography as a tool of contemporary art, and to introduce the photography workshop with Zhuang Wubin to the audience.

“But is this photography?”
Speakers:
* curator/visual artist Nguyễn Như Huy
* photography artists Trần Thành Tiến and Bằng Dương.

Subject:

Photography not only as a tool for capturing reality in a sense of archiving but also as an aesthetic means in a sense of the games of lighting, proportion is not far from the knowledge of Vietnamese audience. Photography, however, as a conceptual intervention of artist into reality and as the amplification for artist’s questions about not only ethics but also about politics and cultural study, is indeed a realm where is still being unconcealed. “Being unconcealed” here should be understood in a sense that there is the amount of images produced in this era of technology and internet has reached an unprecedented level, and accordingly the ways of seeing, of making, of producing the images are also becoming multiply and indefinable. There are numerous amount of contemporary artists who have been using photography, neither as a tool for recording reality nor as an aesthetic means, but as many various ways, they have been using it as a forum for great discussions about the nature of image considered in a relationship with human’s experiences. It is those artists who have brought photography into the landscape (or the space) of contemporary art, i.e. a space of questionings, of shocks, of debates, a space whose essence is always an everlasting anxiety of human beings about their own fate.

In this discussion, by giving a research to some recent distinguished photography works in Vietnam and in the world, curator Nhu Huy will introduce photography as a tool of contemporary art to the audience. And the two photography artisits, Tran Thanh Tien and Bang Duong will share their experience when joining the workshop with Zhuang Wubin last year also their photography projects.

Photo: Catherine Opie – Self-Portrait / Cutting, 1993. Chromogenic Print – 40 x 30 inches (101.6 x 76.2 cm)