MEDIA RELEASE

Day by Day
by Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai
31 January 7 March, 2015
SA SA BASSAC
About the exhibition
Day by Day is an ambitious solo exhibition by Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai, an
internationally award-winning artist based in Hue, Vietnam. The exhibition consists of
four interrelated serial artworks in various media, which draw on one year of extensive
research by the artist in several small fishing communities in Siem Reap and Pursat,
Cambodia as well as in Long An, Vietnam. The men, women and children in these
communities are Vietnamese by birth or by ancestry, but many of them have lived in
Cambodia for years or even for generations. Yet many of them do not hold national ID
Cards from either the Cambodian or Vietnamese government. This lack of formal
identification documents is a source of serious and ongoing difficulties for members of
these communities.
The title of the exhibition is a phrase the artist borrowed from the villagers. In
her artists statement, the artist Nguyen suggests that the villagers frequent use of
this phrase drew the picture of their future. She describes some challenges faced by
this communityilliteracy, poverty, corruption and briberyand laments that I only
saw children trying to live without any idea about the future, seemingly with no future.
This reality is evoked in Nguyens exhibition. Yet despite having a sense of being
suspended in an uncertain present, here pasts and futures repeatedly emerge, as if
irrepressible. Villagers speak openly of their memories, including experiences of war
and conflict, but never of their dreams.
Day by Day presents a set of circumstances that are highly specific to the
case of Vietnamese in Cambodia, yet also of broader relevance, intersecting with
universal questions of citizenship and migration.
After its debut at SA SA BASSAC, the exhibition will travel to Ho Chi Minh City,
Vietnam, to show at Sao La in the Ho Chi Minh Fine Arts Museum.
The exhibition consists of four interrelated serial works:
1.

ID Card (2014) is a participatory installation consisting of over 300 unofficial

identity documents that can be endlessly rearranged. These are printed on
scraps of clothing donated to the artist by the villagers.

2.

Shadow (2014) is a series of hand-colored digital photographs in which the

human figures have been blacked out, at once protectively obscuring
individuals identities and hinting at the communitys shared uncertainty. This
also foregrounds the striking natural and built environment of floating villages
on Cambodias Tonle Sap lake.

3.

Another series of photographic prints, Travels (2014), was commissioned by

Nguyen and produced by a traveling salesperson whose creations are
especially popular in Long An. The images are inexpensively produced digital
collages: a portrait of the head of various villagers is inserted onto the body of
an unknown stranger, who is pictured posing in a photo studio decorated to

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appear like a faraway land. These works are displayed inside a humble house,
built by two Vietnamese construction workers inside the gallery space, using
palm leaves as in the dwellings in the villages that Nguyen visited.
4.

Finally, Day by Day (2014-15) is also the title of a video, in two parts. Day by
Day: In Cambodia is filmed in two villages on the Tonle Sap lake; Day by Day:
In Vietnam is filmed in Long An province, in Vietnam near the Cambodian
border. Both films are based in extended interviews with the villagers, in which
they share intimate memories, and speak of their lives.

About the artist

Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai (born 1983, Hanoi) is an artist based in Hue, Vietnam. Her
work in various media is based in intensive and ongoing research, exploring
challenges faced by individuals and communities. The notion of struggle and an
attention to difficult and repressed feelings remain central to my practice, the artist
explains.
Nguyens previous exhibitions include Swimming in Sand; Growing Rice Under
an Umbrella (Anita Archer Fine Art, Melbourne, Australia, 2014); Unexpected (Chiang
Mai University Museum, 2014); 2013 Asian Report (Artspace A Gallery, Cheongju,
South Korea, 2013); and Riverscapes IN FLUX (Goethe Institut, Vietnam, Thailand,
Myanmar, Philippines, Indonesia, 2012).
Nguyen has undertaken residencies at Sa Sa Art Projects, Phnom Penh
(2014); HIVE Studio, Cheongju, South Korea (2013); New Space Arts Foundation,
Hue, Vietnam (2013) and Sn Art, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (2012). In 2015 she will
commence a 12-month residency at Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, in Berlin, Germany.
Nguyen is a recipient of awards and grants from the Pollock-Krasner
Foundation (2014-15) and the Cultural Development and Exchange Fund (2014 and
2012). In 2015 she is a finalist for the Sovereign Asian Art Prize, to be exhibited in
Hong Kong.
The artist holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Hue College of the Arts, Vietnam
(2006) and a Master of Visual Arts from Mahasarakham University, Thailand (2012).
Day by Day is her first solo exhibition at SA SA BASSAC.
About the curator
Day by Day is guest-curated by Roger Nelson, an independent curator based in
Phnom Penh, and a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne researching
contemporary and modern Cambodian art and culture. Nelson publishes
internationally on Southeast Asian contemporary art, including in ArtAsiaPacific;
Artlink; Contemporaneity: Historical Presence in Visual Culture; Udaya: Journal of
Khmer Studies; and Randian. Recent catalogue essays include Pinaree Sanpitak at
Yavuz Fine Art, Singapore (2014); Khvay Samnang at Tomio Koyama Gallery,
Singapore (2014); and Khvay Samnang at Taipeis Asian Art Biennial (co-authored
with Erin Gleeson, 2013). Roger recently spoke on performance in Cambodian art at
New Yorks Museum of Modern Art (2013), and in 2014 and 2015 is working on
curatorial projects in Cambodia, Australia, Singapore, Thailand, the United Kingdom,
and Vietnam. In 2015-6 he joins Ambitious Alignments: New Histories of Southeast
Asian Art, a research initiative of the Getty Foundation and University of Sydney. He

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has previously curated one group exhibition at SA SA BASSAC, titled new artefacts
(2012).
About SA SA BASSAC Third Floor
SA SA BASSAC is a gallery and resource center, established in 2011,
dedicated to creating, facilitating, producing, and sharing contemporary visual culture
in and from Cambodia.
The exhibition Day by Day launches the Third Floor, a new space above SA
SA BASSACs gallery. In coming months, this space will be transformed into a reading
and learning room, shared working areas, and other flexible space. For Day by Day,
however, the space is preserved as it was previously: a rooftop converted into a wood
workshop built of timber, rattan and concrete.
Public programs
Day by Day, the exhibition, will be accompanied by a dynamic series of public
programs engaging diverse communities in Phnom Penh. These will include:
- an artists talk at 5pm on 31 January 2015
- school visits
- university student visits
- offsite screenings
- a full color catalogue in Khmer, Vietnamese and English including an artists
statement and an essay by the curator.
Media conference
SA SA BASSAC is pleased to invite all journalists to an exclusive preview of
Day by Day, including a media conference in the gallery space, on Thursday 29
January at 10am. The artist and curator will be present and available to answer
questions in English.
Please RSVP by Tuesday 27 January to meta@sasabassac.com if you wish to
attend this media conference.
Please note that no interviews will be granted other than at this media
conference.
Contacts and inquiries
Moeng Meta, Community Projects Manager, SA SA BASSAC
012 768 672
meta@sasabassac.com

Roger Nelson, guest curator of Day by Day

017 508 926
rogeredwardnelson@gmail.com
Erin Gleeson, Artistic Director, SA SA BASSAC
erin@sasabassac.com

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Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai, Travels, 2014. Digital print of digital collage.

Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai, Travels, 2014. Digital print of digital collage.

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Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai, Shadow, 2014. Ink on digital C print.

Nguyen Thi Thanh Mai, ID Card, 2014 (detail). Participatory installation comprising
348 transfer prints on found fabric.