An-My Lê: the artist portraying the inhuman scale of war and small acts of resistance
about 5 months ago (12/07/2023)
An-My Lê: the artist portraying the inhuman scale of war and small acts of resistance Art market Museums & heritage Exhibitions Books Podcasts Columns Technology Adventures with Van Gogh Search Search Artist interview interview An-My Lê: the artist portraying the inhuman scale of war and small acts of resistance Airlifted out of Vietnam as a teenager when Saigon fell, the Vietnamese American photographer makes no attempt to simplify the unbearably complex, and pits individual agency against huge geopolitical forces Dale Berning Sawa 7 December 2023 Share Installation view of Fourteen Views (2023), which represents a river journey from the Mekong to the Mississippi via Parisian water gardens, encompassing Vietnam, its colonisation by France and the military intervention by the US Photo: Jonathan Dorado, © MoMA In 2021, An-My Lê had an out-of-body experience in the Californian desert. The Vietnamese American artist had been photographing at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, a landscape she was deeply familiar with from her 29 Palms (2003-04) series showing marines preparing to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan. Observing the marines’ training exercises once again, Lê was suddenly overcome with grief and transported to her sick mother’s side.