Transpop: Korea Vietnam Remix
The Gatherers
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
6 December 2008 – 15 March 2009

by Tonya Warner

Korea & Vietnam: what do they have in common other than being two Asian countries whose artists are underrepresented in the West? And then there’s the wars America fought in both. This exhibit’s main premise, according to its press release, is that Korea’s growth as a developed nation is linked to its involvement in the Vietnam War on the side of the Americans. This, in turn, lead to an increased cultural exchange between the two nations. This means that the exhibition is a mix between works that address the Vietnam War with ones that analyze contemporary pop culture. To start, this sets up some mighty disparities that are not exactly resolved curatorially.

One of my favorite pieces in the exhibit ironically fits in with neither category of war nor pop culture. It is a video by French-Vietnamese artist Sandrine Llouquet, showing an ant carrying a dragonfly wing across a tiled counter. Shown on a very small screen embedded in the corner of a white cube, the viewer is made to lean over and watch from above. The video is simple, quiet, and mesmerizing.
The issue of war, reconsidered through a modern lens, is beautifully executed in Min Hwa Choi Chul-Hwan’s “Twentieth Century – 1972.6 II.” He creates ephemeral, ghostly prints of the iconic image of Phan Thi Kim Phuc running naked after a napalm attack – one of the most remembered images of the Vietnam War. Chul-Hwan crops and repeats the image in pale hues augmented with pigment accents. The images appears as a specter from the collective past of both Vietnam and America.

Another excellent reminder of the human side of the war comes in the form of a large triptych video piece, “The Farmers and the Helicopters” by Dinh Q. Le, which juxtaposes stock footage of American aerial attacks with interviews with Vietnamese farmers recounting their memories and relationships with helicopters. A more contemporary cultural view of the military is found in Lee Yong-Baek’s startlingly creepy video showing a soldier slowly moving across a field of flower patterns. The figure is almost completely camouflaged against the bright pop patterns – he is only apparent through his motions. The work plays off of the paranoia that still surrounds perceptions of military force and actions.

Although I have pointed out some of the most interesting pieces, the show as a whole seems to be a strange jumbled mix of war and pop culture – of coming to terms politically with a past that seems disconnected to the present culture. Perhaps some of this confusion between the works comes from an utter lack of information. I am sure that the exhibition as a whole would have seemed much more coherent is there was some form of explanation of the thinking and references behind the works. For example, most people coming to this show, I suspect, are probably not well versed in Korean or Vietnamese pop culture, beyond certain stereotypes. Overall, this seems like yet another jumbled Yerba Buena show that has bitten off conceptually more than it can, or maybe should, chew.

Now a note about “The Gatherers: Greening Our Urban Spheres,” the exhibit in the upstairs gallery. The show addresses “environmental issues to urban spatial justice, through interactive programs, urban interventions and public dialogue.” I will say that I am all for urban gardening, for greening up spaces, environmental awareness, picking the neighbor’s fruit, etc. I think the work some of these collectives are doing is quite interesting, but, IT IS NOT ART. Can I say that again? IT’S NOT ART. What is displayed in the space (what can really be displayed with a performative and real-world environmental practice?) comes across as obnoxiously didactic and yes, even a little smug. There might as well have been a sign saying “You buy your vegetables at Safeway? You asshole!” Not to mention the fact that, in San Francisco, this really is preaching to the choir. I said it in the disappointment with the last Bay Area Now show and I’ll say it again – Yerba Buena, there is so much art out there, so much good art, and some of it is even being made in San Francisco, maybe it’s time you exhibit some of it.

http://www.ybca.org/tickets/production/view.aspx?id=7671
http://arkoartcenter.or.kr/english/01_arko_on/exhibition_view.asp?exhibitionSeq=35
http://www.galeriequynh.com/gq/index.htm