KVT – Installation by Dinh Gia Le

Click to enlarge

Flowers and Popcorn

There’s a lovely installation at L’Espace that could be a superb piece. At present it’s a bit like a work in progress and there’s nothing wrong with exhibiting good ideas that can be refined or elaborated upon in the future.
A lot of Vietnamese installational work is not bereft of talent or conceptual initiative but bereft of cash. This great idea by Dinh Gia Le would really zoom if the ephemeral plaster heads and their papery flower brains could have been manufactured out of some more permanent material. My mind kept returning to the ceramic heads and busts sculpted by internationally renowned Chinese/Australian artist Ah Xian (click for images). Translate Le’s decorative motifs onto a porcelain type surface and the effect would be sensational, and such life size heads that mechanically open and close like lotus petals, revealing whirring popcorn like brain flowers, would be a sight to make you stop in your tracks.

At present the electric mechanisms that activate the fields of heads on their see through pedestals are far too noisy to be turned on for extended periods, but I expect that an electronic whiz kid could soon solve that problem.

It’s the type of installation that could very well be a world beater and I’m jealous that the idea wasn’t mine.

If Le did the ceramic bit like I suggested, no accusation of plagiarism could be leveled because if you visit the Monganshan art district in Shanghai you’d see commercial galleries displaying exquisitely decorated and fired ceramic heads by a host of artists.

After the last few exhibitions ( as good as they were or still are) that have all had a lot to say about the state of the nation or the plight of the city, it’s a bit of a relief to be accosted by an art work that is more personal in nature yet still with a future potential to make you stop and become intellectually engaged.

A work in progress that worth progressing!