Michelle Nguyen: Ode to Proteus @ Gillian Jason Gallery
Gillian Jason Gallery presents Michelle Nguyen’s first solo exhibition in the UK. The Canadian-Vietnamese artist investigates shapeshifting and metamorphosis as profound human experiences through physical manifestations of mythological figures and the nature of time and death.
The new series interrogates the accumulation of changes in all aspects of life. Each artwork dissects this central theme, from the challenges of grief, the evolution of cultural beliefs, the morphing of mystical and natural creatures, and the ongoing transformations of our identities. Consequently, in unravelling this concept of human experiences, Nguyen defines these as ‘little deaths’ to allow new versions of ourselves to surface. Through every interaction and small detail, Nguyen's multi-dimensional series takes the viewer on an ardent journey that engulfs the gallery’s space.
Vanitas, 2023. Oil on canvas, 120 x 120 cm. Courtesy Gillian Jason Gallery.
Taking place entirely on the first floor, Gillian Jason Gallery creates a dynamic interaction with the artworks by forming dialogues in theme, styles, and concepts in a circular journey around the room. The exhibition conveys the cycle of the artist’s vision and journey depending on the direction one takes. If the viewer walks clockwise through the space, the artworks explore the wider world, global climate crisis, and familial connections. As one continues through the exhibit, the works become more personal, delving into the artist’s exploration of identity and transformation. The exhibition perfectly balances the use of space and the narrative and concepts of the artist’s new series.
Nguyen’s oeuvre explores death and mourning, her works often acting as a “modern memento mori” to engage viewers in a deeper relationship with grief. The artist creates a dialogue around human mortality and regeneration. To understand that grief is not static but a continuous and ever-changing process accompanying our daily life, one can better appreciate Nguyen’s idea that humans encounter death in various contexts.
Altar for Hungry Ghosts, 2023. Oil on canvas, 180 x 110 cm. Courtesy Gillian Jason Gallery.
Altar for Hungry Ghosts (2023) is an exciting start to the exhibition. Situated immediately next to the gallery entrance, the artwork sets up conversations about the running themes, including Nguyen’s personal experiences of death and mourning. Specifically, the intimate individuality of these experiences is emphasised by incorporating motifs relating to her history intertwined with Buddhist symbols. Buddhist altars, commonly found in many Asian households, come in various sizes and contain comparable elements such as photos of deceased family members, candles, incense, and food offerings.
Detail of Altar for Hungry Ghosts, 2023. Oil on canvas, 180 x 110 cm.
The Altar for Hungry Ghosts is a mesmerising artwork that draws viewers into a visual labyrinth of captivating and enigmatic details that focus on the relationship between food, grief and mourning. One such detail is the dentures on the bottom left side. These dentures represent the pair that were owned by Nguyen’s grandmother and had a place on her family’s altar. Going beyond emotional attachment, the physicality of personal belongings on the altar is a permanent manifestation of grief.
The dentures provide a broader contemplation of sorrow, mourning, and its constantly shifting forms. Nguyen stated that her father placed the dentures on their family’s altar years after her death. It symbolised a moment of vulnerability for her father, usually a stoic man, and the physical absence of her grandmother, resulting in its presence emanating intense emotions in the Nguyen household. For the artist, mourning is a complex process, and there is no correct way to grieve. Nguyen invites viewers to engage with the sensitive and heavy emotions surrounding death and mourning in more profound and nuanced ways; despite the discomfort that may arise from doing so, it is important to recognise it as a fundamental part of the human experience.
Detail of Altar for Hungry Ghosts, 2023. Oil on canvas, 180 x 110 cm.
Furthermore, the lotus flower, the national flower of Vietnam, symbolises rebirth and optimism for the future. The lotus flower symbolises the cycle of life as its process grows from muddy waters, blooms, withers, and scatters its seeds before returning to the depths. The lotus flower’s beautiful rendition is captured in vibrant shades of pink, reaching up towards the photo of a loved one. Its roots are severed in two, and although cut in half, they continue to grow and intertwine their organic beauty with the physical manifestations of memories offered to the venerated ancestor.
Nguyen's work highlights the interplay between life and death, destruction and regeneration, blurring the lines between them. The variety of food offerings mixed with the foliage and flowers present an abundance of life yet are surrounded by the fog of grief. Nguyen's highly detailed story-weaving paintings project the viewer into the artist’s personal and immersive experience of family, culture, and memories.
Smokescreen (2023) and Flooded Fountain (2023) explore a different yet related type of human grief: that of global climate change. Rather than an individual process of grieving, it is the deterioration of a wider collective.
Fu dog statues have traditionally been placed outside homes, tombs, and temples to protect people from negative energies and malevolent spirits. These mythical lion-like creatures serve as guardians and provide a sense of security. In Flooded Fountain, the stone fu dog has water pouring out of its eye sockets. While in Smokescreen, the other draws viewers into its vacant stare, void of the life emanating from it, with an open mouth releasing its remaining energy.
Here the fu dogs respond to catastrophic natural disasters and the scars of climate change taking place around them - this is something they cannot protect the Earth’s inhabitants from. Relating to the concept of “modern memento mori” and these little daily deaths, the artworks, united in their shared message, mythically visualise mourning the constant loss and disturbance of our planet’s fragile ecosystem.
Shapeshifter, 2023. Oil on canvas, 145 x 180 cm. Courtesy Gillian Jason Gallery.
Working one’s way around the gallery in a clockwise motion, Shapeshifter (2023) is one of the final works included in the exhibition. As an amalgamation of the collective and the individual, it is a perfect conclusion.
Specifically, the work revitalises the notion of self-regeneration to create new and emerging forms. These are expressed through expressed ideas of ambiguous and unpredictable transformation of exterior and interior human forms. Here, a blend of forms, human and animal, intertwined with biomorphic tendrils to create a mystifying shapeshifting creature, also in a state of flux as if on the verge of transforming into something else.
Its pendant, Werewolves (2023), also addresses such themes, but with its more subject-driven title, it takes a more animalistic approach to themes expressed in Shapeshifter.
Werewolves, 2023, oil on canvas, 150 x 230 cm. Courtesy Gillian Jason Gallery.
Nguyen's works often feature faceless figures, often women, who emphasise the hidden aspect of identity and experiences. Shapeshifter is one of the most brilliant examples of this. Through dedicated research, she explores the significance of the face in symbolism and mythology, questioning whether it can represent the totality of one’s true self.
Although these faceless, unidentifiable figures are eerie, they are intended to reveal something personal to each viewer about themselves. Any of these figures could be that individual. Even more profound than this, Nguyen challenges the idea that identity is fixed and easily recognisable by others and asks one what identity means to them. Rather than being something immovable and inherent, she presents it as something that is constantly in flux and created anew at any moment. Thus, by removing faces, the artist suggests that identity is constantly in flux and begins anew in every moment rather than static.
Whilst these ideas are shown literally in the subject matter, it also translates into her creative material process. Using an unfinished painting as her starting point, Nguyen breathes new life into an old, forgotten canvas. In a broader scope, the layers of the painting act as a metaphor for reflecting the human experience and how one is shaped by our own experiences.
Michelle Nguyen.
Nguyen’s Ode to Proteus exhibition is one of complexity providing deep contemplation of humanity and identity, rebirth and death, and metamorphosis wrapped and presented through the artist’s distinctive Canadian-Vietnamese heritage and culture. As viewers take in each artwork, there is something new and profound to engage in. Nguyen's work evokes powerful emotions and highlights our existential realities.
Michelle Nguyen: Ode to Proteus is on view at Gillian Jason Gallery until July 01, 2023
Kendra Lee
Co-Review Editor, MADE IN BED
