Los Angeles Times - 23.08.2019

E2 FRIDAY, AUGUST 23, 2019 LATIMES.COM/CALENDAR

POP MUSIC ART

mysterious, sealed in a visu-

al symbolism all their own.

Phan Thao Nguyen’s

equally fantastical scenes

are similarly opaque, even

though they are painted on

the pages of a book about Vi-

etnam by a 17th century

French missionary. Ngu-

yen’s drawings literally over-

write this text, augmenting

and reframing a Westerner’s

account with a local one.

For Ngo Dình Bao Chau,

illegibility seems to be part

of the project. She has in-

stalled a small black-box

theater setting for her elegi-

ac drawings of flowers, grave

sites, and children, holding

viewers at a distance. Each

An ambitious project at

the South L.A. gallery the

Mistake Room seeks to in-

troduce local audiences to

contemporary Vietnamese

art. “Where the Sea Remem-

bers” — encompassing an

exhibition, program series

and website— features 15

artists active after 2007,

when communist Vietnam

entered the World Trade Or-

ganization and relaxed its

borders, allowing for greater

exchange with the rest of the

world.

The show — thoughtfully

curated by the Mistake

Room’s artistic director,

Cesar Garcia-Alvarez, with

staff members Nicolas

Orozco-Valdivia and Kris

Kuramitsu — is no doubt an

indicator of the economic

rise of Vietnam. As we’ve

seen with China and India, a

strong contemporary art

market definitively marks

one’s arrival on the interna-

tional cultural scene.

The most relatable works

are those that address cross-

cultural interactions. Tuan

Andrew Nguyen’s “Letters

From Saigon to Saigon” is a

series of larger-than-life size

reproductions of a hand-

written letter sent from Viet-

namese rapper Wowy to

African American rapper

Saigon.

The text bubbles over

with Wowy’s sheer excite-

ment at connecting with

Saigon, whom he discovered

on the internet.Between the

lines, we can feel his desire

to see himself reflected in a

global culture — he laments

Vietnamese ignorance of

hip-hop — but also Viet-

nam’s strange relationship

with the U.S. After all, the

letter only exists because of

the legacies of war, loss and

sacrifice that led Saigon to

name himself in honor of the

black soldiers who fought in

the Vietnam War.

Phan Quang’s poignant

photographs probe more in-

timate relations. His images

document the families of

Japanese soldiers who re-

mained in Vietnam after

World War II. These men

married Vietnamese women

and started families, only to

abandon them when called

home to Japan after Viet-

namgained independence.

Quang depicts the descen-

dants, draped under a gauzy

white veil, with pictures of

their absent patriarchs. The

veil suggests the ghostly

presence of the missing men

and a family life frozen in

time, but it’s also a protec-

tive, sanctifying gesture, de-

flecting the discrimination

these families have faced

because of their mixed herit-

age.

Other works take a more

personal, surreal tone. San-

drine Llouquet, who was

born in France to Viet-

namese parents but now

lives in Ho Chi Minh City,

creates beautiful, delicate

drawings inspired by her in-

terest in religion and spir-

ituality. They are lovely and

drawing is cryptically cap-

tioned in flat, and therefore

unreadable, Vietnamese

Braille.

The inclusion of these

more introspective, even re-

calcitrant works speaks not

only to the depth and diver-

sity of the Vietnamese art

scene but to the curators’

desire to present a multi-fac-

eted survey that reaches be-

yond works that are easily

legible.

As they say in their intro-

duction to the show, this is

just a starting point.

In the interim, there’s al-

ways the Propeller Group.

The artist collective’s faux-

aged paintings of Russian

revolutionary leader Vladi-

mir Lenin, each with a differ-

ent Leonardo DiCaprio hair-

style, require no translation

at all.

The Mistake Room,1811 E.

20th St., L.A. Open Wednes-

days-Saturdays, through

Oct. 12. (213) 749-1200, tmr.la

Women try to

remember all

In the show “Please Re-

call to Me Everything You

Have Thought of ” at the L.A.

gallery Morán Morán, artist

Eve Fowler brings together

20 female artists in the later

years of their careers. The

show’s title comes from a

text by Gertrude Stein,

whose writings Fowler has

explored in her own work.

It’s a polite, if unreasonable

request — who can recall

everything? Still, it speaks to

a hunger for artistic and cul-

tural inheritance. If these

are our foremothers, we

want to know as much as

they are willing to share.

The show seems to or-

ganize itself around at least

two themes: the sensate

body and the rigors of geom-

etry. Exemplifying the for-

mer are three works by the

venerable Barbara Ham-

mer, a pioneer in represent-

ing lesbian sensuality, who

died this year. Her black-

and-white photographs of

female nudes in natural set-

tings, taken in the early

1970s, are disarmingly frank

but also hark back to a long

line of art historical repre-

sentations of women in na-

ture. Her film “Dyketactics”

from 1974 (here presented in

a video transfer) uses

dreamlike double exposures

and hazy golden light to cap-

ture similarly prelapsarian

moments.

Another standout is the

1981 photograph “Rapunzel”

by Senga Nengudi, better

known for performance and

sculptural works that use

stretched and twisted tex-

tiles to refer to the human

form.

Awoman, her face cov-

ered by a pair of nylons,

leans out of the first-story

window of a dilapidated

building. The legs of the ny-

lons stretch downward, end-

ing in two dark braids that

graze the rubble below. As

Hammer’s work reframes

the pastoral tradition

through a contemporary

lens, Nengudi recasts the

European fairy tale as a fu-

tile fantasy.

Alongside such figurative

works, Fowler has included

many that are resolutely ab-

stract. Harriet Korman’s

“Untitled” from 2016-18 is sur-

prisingly engaging despite

its conventional format. It’s

a rectangle divided into four

quadrants, each filled with

colored stripes. But unlike a

lot of hard-edge abstraction,

the stripes vary serendip-

itously in width and inten-

sity. It’s an unruly grid that

seems to pulse and shift be-

fore one’s eyes.

Maren Hassinger’s pho-

tograph “Whole Cloth,” from

2017, weaves the sensuous

and the abstract together. It

depicts a close-up view of in-

terwoven fabrics in varying

shades of beige and tan. It’s a

simple gesture, like Kor-

man’s painting, presenting a

wavering, imperfect grid. It

also suggests weaving — tra-

ditionally women’s work —

as a precursor to the grid as

aesthetic framework. The

systematic warp and weft of

the loom, after all, was the

template for the first

computer.

Fowler is documenting

the women in this show in

the film “With It Which It as

if It Is Meant to Be, Part II,”

which will be screened at the

gallery in September.

Morán Morán,937 N. La Ci-

enega Blvd., L.A., through

Saturday. (310) 652-1711,

moranmorangallery.com

THE “RE/COVER”series depicts former Japanese soldiers and the descendants they left behind in Vietnam, after WWII. Here is “no.2.”

Phan QuangThe Mistake Room

AROUND THE GALLERIES

Vietnamese artistry runs deep

“THE CHYMICAL AIR,”a 2015 work created with pencil, watercolor and ink by

Sandrine Llouquet, a visual artist who was born in France to Vietnamese parents.

Sandrine LlouquetThe Mistake Room

“RAPUNZEL,”a 1981 photograph, portrays an exercise in futility as a woman

leans out of a window, but this time, it’s nylons, not hair, she lets hang down.

Senga NengudiThomas Erben Gallery

An exhibit at South

L.A.’s Mistake Room

elevates the diversity

of contemporary art

from the Asian nation.

By Sharon Mizota

Taylor Swifties: Prepare
for new takes on old songs.
The 29-year-old singer-
songwriter told “CBS Sun-
day Morning” reporter
Tracy Smith that she’ll rere-
cord her catalog in the wake
of Big Machine Label Group
chief Scott Borchetta’s re-
cent sale of the company —
and with it all of Swift’s first
six albums — to talent man-
ager Scooter Braun.
“That’s a plan?” Smith
asks Swift during the inter-
view slated to air Sunday.
“Yeah, absolutely,” said
Swift, whose new album,
“Lover,” is out Friday.
No details were offered
on whether that constitutes
some, most or all of the six
studio albums and nearly
four dozen singles — 19 of
which have reached the top
10 of Billboard’s Hot 100
chart — she has put out
since her 2006 debut album,
“Taylor Swift,” was released
when she was just 16.
Swift publicized her
displeasure over Braun’s
$300-million purchase of Big
Machine when the news sur-
faced in June, stating that
Braun’s control over her re-
cordings constituted “my
worst nightmare” because of
Braun’s role in the long-run-
ning dust-up between Swift
and rapper Kanye West and
his wife, Kim Kardashian.
“Essentially,” she posted
on Tumblr at the time, “my
musical legacy is about to lie
in the hands of someone who
tried to dismantle it.”
Singer Kelly Clarkson
quickly went on Twitter urg-
ing Swift to record new ver-
sions that would give fans an
alternative to those now
controlled by Braun.
By rerecording those old-
er songs and releasing them
anew, Swift — and presum-
ably her current label, Re-
public Records — would re-
ceive the proceeds from
physical and digital sales
and streaming revenues, in-
cluding songwriting roy-
alties.
Revenue generated by
the original versions will go
to Big Machine.
On Thursday’s “Good
Morning America,” Swift
confirmed her plans: “My
contract says that starting
November 2020 — so, next
year — I can record albums 1
through 5 all over again. I’m
very excited about it be-
cause I think that artists de-
serve to own their work. I’m
very passionate about that.”
It’s a strategy other art-
ists have turned to over the
decades. During an ex-
tended contract dispute
with Warner Bros. Records,
Prince threatened to re-
record his entire catalog but
never followed through, re-
leasing only an updated ver-
sion of his hit single “1999.”
Chuck Berry and Jerry
Lee Lewis are among many
’50s recording artists who re-
recorded their best-known
works with new labels be-
cause of contract disputes
with the labels for whom
they created the originals.
In a Tumblr post last
month, Swift wrote, “Hope-
fully, young artists or kids
with musical dreams will
read this and learn about
how to better protect them-
selves in a negotiation. You
deserve to own the art you
make.”

TAYLORSwift aims to
regain control over her
catalog by rerecording it.

Richard ShotwellInvision / AP

Taylor

Swift

begins

again

Angry over sale of

catalog to Scooter

Braun, she plans to

rerecord early albums.

By Randy Lewis