Uploaded February 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
MOCA presented a screening of Tyrant Star (2009) and IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS (2021) in September 2023, followed by this in-conversation with Diane Severin Nguyen and curator Lauren Mackler.
Tyrant Star, 2009
Filmed entirely in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Tyrant Star prompts viewers to consider how cultural touchstones like songs and shared histories are fragmented and woven together in new ways over time. The work unfolds in three chapters, beginning with a view of the metropolis set to Ca Dao, or Vietnamese folk poems, before shifting to an aspiring YouTube star performing a cover of “The Sound of Silence” and concluding with footage of children at a Ho Chi Minh City orphanage. Although each chapter focuses on different voices and perspectives, they are linked by messages of grief and care that remain unheard or misunderstood and by reminders of pain, isolation, and trauma. Nguyen’s camera captures trash-strewn landscapes, quiet interiors, and fragmented bodies, highlighting subtle movements that suggest our surroundings are alive, swelling with the memories of the past.
IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS, 2021
Set in Warsaw, Poland, IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS loosely follows the character of an orphaned Vietnamese child who grows up to be absorbed into a South Korean pop-inspired dance group. Widely popular within a Polish youth subculture, K-pop is used by the artist as a vernacular material to trace a relationship between Eastern Europe and Asia with roots in Cold War allegiances. Spilling over from first-person narrative into near-abstraction and pop music video, Nguyen traverses the complicated beauty and multivalent forms of propaganda that underpin cultural (and self) image making.
MOCA Artist Film Series is organized by Clara Kim, Chief Curator & Director of Curatorial Affairs with Alitzah Oros, Public Programming Associate, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. MOCA Artist Film Series is presented by The Edward F. Limato Foundation.
MOCA presented a screening of Tyrant Star (2009) and IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS (2021) in September 2023, followed by this in-conversation with Diane Severin Nguyen and curator Lauren Mackler.
Tyrant Star, 2009
Filmed entirely in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Tyrant Star prompts viewers to consider how cultural touchstones like songs and shared histories are fragmented and woven together in new ways over time. The work unfolds in three chapters, beginning with a view of the metropolis set to Ca Dao, or Vietnamese folk poems, before shifting to an aspiring YouTube star performing a cover of “The Sound of Silence” and concluding with footage of children at a Ho Chi Minh City orphanage. Although each chapter focuses on different voices and perspectives, they are linked by messages of grief and care that remain unheard or misunderstood and by reminders of pain, isolation, and trauma. Nguyen’s camera captures trash-strewn landscapes, quiet interiors, and fragmented bodies, highlighting subtle movements that suggest our surroundings are alive, swelling with the memories of the past.
IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS, 2021
Set in Warsaw, Poland, IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS loosely follows the character of an orphaned Vietnamese child who grows up to be absorbed into a South Korean pop-inspired dance group. Widely popular within a Polish youth subculture, K-pop is used by the artist as a vernacular material to trace a relationship between Eastern Europe and Asia with roots in Cold War allegiances. Spilling over from first-person narrative into near-abstraction and pop music video, Nguyen traverses the complicated beauty and multivalent forms of propaganda that underpin cultural (and self) image making.
MOCA Artist Film Series is organized by Clara Kim, Chief Curator & Director of Curatorial Affairs with Alitzah Oros, Public Programming Associate, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. MOCA Artist Film Series is presented by The Edward F. Limato Foundation.
