In Tammy Nguyen’s self-titled exhibit at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, she repeats a question that was originally posed by Ralph Waldo Emerson, “What is a farm but a mute Gospel?” It’s a question that Nguyen is prepared to try to answer through her paintings, collage, and self-published art books in the exhibit. Nguyen is a talented artist, born 1984 in San Francisco.Her father was a Vietnamese refugee. Her work spans several disciplines across environmental, geopolitical, and spiritual themes. With many of her works featuring abundant landscapes that take a close look at obscure histories. She often uses representations of animals, as well as symbols of soft power.
Sampan had the pleasure of interviewing Tammy Nguyen. When I asked Tammy what inspired her exhibit at the ICA, she responded, “One thing that’s important about my work and how I come up with ideas is I have a lot of ideas in my mind that are unexplored, and I keep them back there in the arsenal, and they don’t really get unpacked or deeply explored or probed until the opportunity arises. When the ICA invited me to do an exhibition, I was already making a lot of work thinking about the landscape and ideas about manifest destiny and conquest and post colonialism. And because the ICA is in Boston, I was like ‘this might be a good time for me to think about transcendentalism”.
Nguyen added, “I had been interested in Tyler Green’s work about landscape already. I was interested in his book about Yosemite, and I knew that he had just newly published an edition of Emerson’s “Nature”, the essay that is so widely read across America that has really kind of influenced so much of the ways in which the American landscape is defined and considered. Tyler Green’s edition of “Nature” is also juxtaposed with a very vast collection of American landscape paintings. I started thinking about the essay, reread it, and thought a lot about sort of just the history of American landscape paintings, and that’s kind of where the seeds began.”
In the middle of the gallery on a dais sits a case containing 4 of Tammy’s handmade books on display. Three of them were opened to pages of interest with a fourth closed with its burgundy cover able to be viewed. Each of the opened books have beautifully marbled inside covers. The marbling is expertly done in greens, yellows, reds, and blue swirls. The books are also seasonally themed and are titled “Fall,” Winter,” Spring”, and “Summer.” They are made from a variety of materials including bookcloth, cardstock, inkjet printing, polymer letterpress, and hot stamping. The museum label informs the viewer that “the artist book is the art form at the heart of Tammy’s multi-disciplinary practice” as evidenced by its placement in the center of the gallery. The label further informs that the books take the form of the spider-book which is a style of binding. The books are made to resemble mountains and are meant to remind the viewer of landscapes found in “Nature.”
There are 2 exceptionally large paintings in the gallery that are each approximately 20 feet long. One titled “Three Vietnamese Officials Study Land Reform” is made of 4 panels. The other large-scale painting is titled “Shot Heard ‘Round the World.” They were made using watercolor, vinyl paint, ink, screen printing ink, pastel, and metal leaf on paper stretched over a panel. “Shot Heard ‘Round the World” was inspired by a trip Nguyen took to Old Manse in Concord Massachusetts which is where Emerson lived when he wrote “Nature.” In “Three Vietnamese Officials Study Land Reform”, Tammy creates stories around three Vietnamese men whose passport photos she came across in the U.S.National Archives and combines them with 19th century landscape paintings and a spreadsheet from a land reform project.
Tammy spoke about being an artist. “I’m living the dream. I can’t believe I’m so lucky to be able to be an artist and to explore these ideas that are so deep inside of me. I just can’t believe that I’m able to just unpack these things and share them with people and be able to sort of engage so deeply with different cultures and histories.” She went on about her formation “I began making art as early as I can remember. I’ve always been enamored by materials and colors and drawing, and I think I have a little bit of one foot in front of the other attitude about art making and maybe life in general. I think that when I was young, I started making art and I had amazing teachers growing up. Not necessarily art teachers, but, like, just teachers in general who were really encouraging of me when they saw that I was excited about making art. When I was in high school, I applied to my dream school, which was the Cooper Union, and I couldn’t believe that I got in and I went, and it completely transformed my life and my way of living and everything. Then after that, after undergrad, I went to Vietnam and became a Fulbright fellow, where I studied Lacquer painting. And that was extraordinary for me because it just kind of expanded my worldview in ways that I couldn’t imagine. One thing led to the next, and then I went to grad school and started making art and teaching and everything. Here we are.”
In the pages of the books displayed in the middle of the room and through the complexities of the paintings on the wall, Tammy attempts to answer the question posed at the entrance to her show, “What is a farm but a mute Gospel?” Whether or not she is successful in that endeavor, it is up to each viewer to decide, but I think she succeeded in her efforts. Tammy Nguyen’s exhibit is vibrant and interesting; it really pulls the viewer in. The exhibit is on display at the Institute of Contemporary Art until January 28, 2024.
