Vietnam Art Collection (VAC) is delighted to present Overvoltage by the artist/sculptor Vy Trinh at the Gia Lam Train Factory in Hanoi - a historic industrial site loaded with the Vietnamese colonial past and memory. This is the artist’s first independent project after returning to Vietnam upon completing the MFA program at the University of Pennsylvania.

Overvoltage is a site-responsive intervention employing the space as a primary material. The artist will take the factory’s abandoned electric supply room and turn it into a site at once, organic and mechanical, human and nonhuman. It will witness the encounter between remnants of the space and a sculptor who will produce on-site within a specific time frame, using materials sourced from local electrical supply stores, adhering to its industrial functionality and the ecologies within and near the factory in the Long Bien District.

Overvoltage proposes that a particular site is not necessarily overcast by its socio-political shadows but can rather be felt and made present through effects – like how electricity current delivers, flows, and interrupts. The artist utilizes her labor work on-site to reveal the kind of personality the site once had and has as of now - being exposed, intervened, coming into sudden contact with strangers, awaiting an undetermined future.

This project is part of VAC’s LAUNCH, an alternative support program that reflects on existing models of artist and curatorial residency, means of cultural production, and the role of art institutions in the context of Vietnamese society. VAC designs this locally grounded program to help build a sustainable ecosystem where Vietnamese artists, curators, writers, and creatives can grow and thrive. The program includes providing grants, resources, mentorship, and exhibition opportunities to help realize and promote recent art projects and research work that responds to the shifting environment in Vietnam; inviting international fellows to conduct a two-week field trip in Hanoi and interact with the local community; forging cross-platform relationships among institutions and organizations to facilitate cultural production and exchanges across borders.

Curated by Van Do and organized by Á Space

On the occasion of UNESCO's Hanoi Festival of Creative Design

Dates: 17 Nov - 31 Dec, 2023

Location: High-voltage electric station 33B, Gia Lâm Train Factory, Long Biên District, Hanoi

Read about the artist's interview conducted on site by VAC.

About the artist:

Vy Trịnh (b. 1996, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam) is a sculptor whose work explores how networks of objects extend beyond themselves and reflect contemporary Vietnam's larger socio-economic textures and conditions. Her practice follows the traffic of objects, different forms of labor and agency, and the sites where these categories are constantly being negotiated and improvised.

Vy holds an MFA from the University of Pennsylvania and a BFA from Parsons School of Design. Select group exhibitions include Worthless Studios (Brooklyn, NY), Atelier (Philadelphia, PA), Automat (Philadelphia, PA), White Columns (New York, NY), and Gallery MC (New York, NY). Vy is the recipient of the 2022 Christopher Lyon Memorial Award. Select awarded grants include the Humanities Urbanism Design Initiative (H+U+D) (2022), The Sachs Program for Art Innovation (2022), and the Center for Experimental Ethnography (2022). She currently lives and works in Ho Chi Minh City and New York.

About the curator:

Vân Đỗ (b. 1995, Vietnam) is a Hanoi-based curator and writer whose practice concerns artistic interventions and negotiation of existing sites and seeks for critical engagements with the local communities. From 2019 to 2021, Vân worked in the curatorial team of The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre (HCMC). Since 2022, Van has been Artistic Director of Á Space, an artist-driven independent space for experimental practices in Hanoi.

Selected exhibitions include: White Noise (Nguyen Art Foundation, HCMC, 2023); Tương tương ngộ ngộ cá kho tộ, ngộ ngộ tương tương đậu kho tương (Á Space, Hanoi, 2023); IN:ACT 2022 (Nhà Sàn Collective & Á Space, Hanoi & Kassel, 2022); Hà Ninh Pham: Recursive Fables (A+ WORKS of ART, Kuala Lumpur, 2022); Within / Between / Beneath / Upon (The Factory, HCMC, 2021); An ode to the microscopic (Dcine, HCMC, 2020).

All photos taken by Trieu Chien, courtesy of the artist and VAC.