NEWS
The talk presents research that is part of Denisa Tomkova's forthcoming book Empowering Aesthetics. Contemporary Art from Post-Socialist Central Europe (Bloomsbury, 2025).
The Seminar of Accidental Wisdom at the FAMU Department of Photography in Prague.
BETWEEN PERSONAL AND COLLECTIVE MEMORY
On the art of the second generation of the Czech and Slovak Vietnamese community
Lenka Štěpánková
The exhibition Memory Building Sites at Galerie 35M2 in Prague was created as a dialogue between the research of curator Denisa Tomková and the works of Kvet Nguyen and Quynh Trang Tran, artists from the youngest generation of the Vietnamese diaspora. We spoke with the curator and one of the artists about the themes of identity and cultural memory.
Race Was Elsewhere: The Politics of Whiteness in Post-socialist Eastern Europe
Kvet Nguyen, Academy of Fine Arts and Design, Bratislava
Denisa Tomková, Charles University, Prague
According to the official state socialist ideology, racism did not exist in socialist Eastern Europe. ‘Race [was] elsewhere’ (Alamgir 2013), in the capitalist West. Socialist international cooperation included worker and student mobility exchanges (from Vietnam, Cuba, Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East) and political and economic alliances and represented a strong anti-colonial solidarity. What happened to migrants from the Global South after the fall of the Wall? Are their stories included in the collective memory of Ostalgia? Were official state-socialist policies on the equality of all races congruent with the actual experiences of migrants from the Global South? What was the experience of the already present internal racialized neighbours, namely the Roma? How can we understand racialization of Roma in the broader context of the BLM movement and local ‘Roma Lives Matter’ responses? How did the project of ‘national eugenics’ impact ideas about racial hierarchies, whiteness, and ethnically coded divisions in society? How has the artistic production in the region responded to these questions? Non-involvement in the colonies is used as an argument in the context of decolonization, but how did Eastern Europeans benefit from the colonial project? The politics of whiteness emerge today in the context of neo-authoritarian governments, with the heroization of national history and the notion of a victorious national body being promoted. What are the experiences of artists of colour living in the region today? Can contemporary art challenge these narratives and contribute to a more inclusive collective memory?
Proposals may include presentations of theoretical papers and artistic presentations of various formats (maximum 20 minutes each) are particularly encouraged.
The current exhibition Memory Building Sites reflects on the everyday racism experienced by Czech and Slovak residents, not only by artists of Vietnamese origin. In her review, Tereza Stejskalová focuses on the broader context of the decolonization of Czech (and thus Slovak) society through the Vietnamese experience.
FHS is starting a Feminist Reading Group. It will begin meeting at the beginning of the Winter 2024 semester (7.10.2024). It is organized by Dr. Denisa Tomkova from the Department of Art Theory and Production at FHS UK.
EXHIBITION OF THE WEEK
"It goes back to where it all began. "What we knew about Czechoslovakia was that it was very cold there and that you had to wear two socks on top of each other," the artist's grandmother Quynh Trang Tran, over 90, recalls in the video, of the time when she sent her daughter - the artist's mother, that is - out of Vietnam with just a pair of T-shirts and jeans to an unknown country.
...
In a small space, but in a concentrated form, Memory Building Sites recalls the clashes and conflicts, hopes and disappointments that their parents' generation went through. The exhibition brings to light their uprootedness, while at the same time suggesting the process by which this initial uprootedness sets down roots for the second generation. Memory Building Sites was curated by Denisa Tomková and is on view at Žižkov's 35M2 gallery until October 25. "
Pavel Turek
Memory is changeable, selective and always at risk of being forgotten. This exhibition aims to challenge forgetting and selective memory in the post-socialist Czech and Slovak context, shedding light on overlooked narratives of the Vietnamese diaspora. By working with family and community archives, artists Kvet Nguyen and Quynh Trang Tran reconstruct forgotten stories, contributing to a more nuanced and heterogeneous collective memory.
exhibitors: Kvet Nguyen & Quynh Trang Tran
curator: Denisa Tomková
The artistic strategies explored in this book are essential tools in fostering emancipatory consciousness in marginalized communities. Empowering Aesthetics weaves together case studies from the post-socialist Central European region (the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia) to show how art can provide critical support to gender, sexual and racialized groups. The empowering aesthetics employed by the artists in this book are not only urgent and critical, but also vitally personal, each chapter building a clear understanding of what social equality looks like in these specific political and geographic contexts. These practices are a response to the rise of nationalism, homophobia, transphobia, and xenophobia in the region.
Engaging with contemporary philosophy and feminist, queer and decolonial (art) theory (Sara Ahmed, Judith Butler, Angela Dimitrakaki, Boris Groys, Jack Halberstam, Grant Kester, Ewa Majewska, Paul B. Preciado, Legacy Russell, Madina Tlostanova, etc.), this book highlights a shift in the understanding of the artwork and aesthetic experience that is enduring rather than immediate, drawing attention to a given community. The projects discussed in this book are created with the artist and the wider community or family in mind and are created in intersubjective connection with others. This volume highlights that empowering aesthetics perform an important function in challenging these narratives while contributing to building an inclusive collective memory that emancipate systematically marginalized individuals and communities.
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction
2. (Not) Being at Home in Institutions
3. Unintended Diaspora
4. Survival of Those Who Fit?
5. Can a Woman Sing?
6 Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Published 17 Apr 2025
BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC
11:40 - 13:10 - Block 2: Post-Socialist
Memory and Identity
Denisa Tomková - Empowering Aesthetics of Vietnamese Diaspora Artists in Post-Socialist Central Europe
Organised by:
Branislava Kuburović (School of Art and Design, Prague City University),
Irena Řehořová (Fakulta humanitních studií, Karlova univerzita)
Ondřej Váša (Fakulta humanitních studií, Karlova univerzita
Open Day at FHS Charles University
On 1 February 2024, the Faculty of Humanities will open its doors to all those interested in studying. Lecture "Who's free here, or is emancipation not just Barbie" will take place at 14:45.
In a column and newsletter called Five Books, the selected person recommends five books in an area they understand. On January 10, 2024, the theatre scholar and book editor Zuzana Andrejco Ferusová selects these 5 books, including Wandering Concepts (ed. Denisa Tomková).
FLASH ART #70, 12/2023-3/2024, Czech & Slovak Edition, published a book review of the book Wandering Concepts/Putujúce koncepty, edited by Denisa Tomková, published by Kunsthalle Bratislava. The book review by Dáša Oršuliaková.
Triaška and Čejka_FM
Radio_FM | Wednesday 4.10.2023
Olja talks about the exhibition "Nhớ: The Space Between One End and the Other" at the Kunsthalle Bratislava, with curators Kvet Nguyen and Denisa Tomkova.
"She has worked at universities in the USA and the UK, where she also earned a PhD in visual culture. She taught at the Centre for Audiovisual Studies at FAMU and also directed the editorial programme of the Bratislava Kunsthalle. Here, among other things, together with Kvet Nguyen, she prepared the exhibition Nhớ: Space Between One End and the Other, which presents the work of young artists belonging to the second generation of the Vietnamese diaspora. Her work at the art institution is summarised in a recently published book - an anthology of texts expanding on the themes of each exhibition, Wandering Concepts. Denisa Tomková, Ph.D., will be preparing her next publication at the Faculty of Humanities, where she will start as an assistant professor at the Department of Art Theory and Production in October. In a hushed faculty building before the start of the semester, we talk together about the upcoming book and upcoming courses, the art of the Vietnamese minority, and the sense of loss of home." 23.09.2023
Nhớ: Space Between One End and the Other
Participating artists: Maithu Bùi / Diana Cam Van Nguyen / Kimberly Nguyen / Kvet Nguyen / Minh Thang Pham / Anna Tran / Quynh Trang Tran / Nhu Xuan Hua
06.09. - 13.10. 2023
Kunsthalle Bratislava
Curated by: Kvet Nguyen and Denisa Tomková
Denisa Tomková. "Project ERROR: Potential for Care Beyond Exhibitions" in Stella Rollig, Christiane Erharter (eds.) Robert Gabris. This Space Is Too Small For Our Bodies (2023, Belveder 21, Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther & Franz König) ISBN 978-3-7533-0535-6
The book Wandering Concepts acknowledges the connectiveness of the peripheries and seeing ourselves situated in the transnational network. Opening to “wandering concepts” also means opening to critical thinking, to ideas, to sharing spaces and to understanding our local position in relation to the global system (political and historical forces). Through access to this common language of “wandering concepts”, we can imagine the alternative world we want to create. The essays in this anthology expand on the concepts proposed by Kunsthalle Bratislava’s exhibition programming, by providing further critical discursive thinking in the form of essays and poems by international thinkers. The book is divided into six chapters based on each exhibition project that these essays relate to.
Contributors / Autori*ky textov: Sara Ahmed, Laura Amann, Jay Bernard, Jos Boys, Judith Butler, Simone R. Caljouw, Elio Choquette, Emanuele Coccia, Angela Dimitrakaki, Luki Essender, Mikkel Krause Frantzen, Marina Garcés, Jack Halberstam, Aziza Harmel, Walidah Imarisha, Barbara Kapusta, Grant Kester, Dávid Koronczi, Jen Kratochvil, Sophie Lewis, Paul Maheke, José Esteban Muñoz, Lola Olufemi, Lara Perry, Julius Pristauz, Legacy Russell, Raoni Saleh, Joy Mariama Smith, Kathryn Bond Stockton, Rob Withagen
Editor/ Editorka: Denisa Tomková
Translation / Preklady: Denisa Tomková
Copyediting and proofreading / Jazykové korektúry: Zuzana Andrejco Ferusová, Denisa Tomková
Graphic Design / Grafický dizajn: Lukáš Kollár
Supported by / Projekt podporili: ERSTE Stiftung, VŠVU
Interview for Flash Art Czech & Slovak Edition, 67, 2023.
Exhibition: 3.11 - 2.12. 2022
Slovak Institute, Budapest
What is identity and how is it shaped and influenced by its environment? How can a diasporic community shape and preserve its collective memory and how can it avoid ‘collective amnesia’ (Koleka Putuma)? Memory, the notion of belonging and the diasporic identity of the Slovak-Vietnamese community is shaped by diverse influences and experiences. Often photography facilitates the preservation of memories and serves as a reminder of distant places. However, at the same time, photography is an imperial and colonial tool.
A Vietnamese-American essayist and poet Ocean Vuong writes:
‘In Vietnamese, the word for missing someone and remembering them is the same: nhớ. Sometimes, when you ask me over the phone, Con nhớ mẹ không? I flintch, thinking you meant, Do you remember me?
I miss you more than I remember you.’
It could be used as a metaphor for reading Nguyen’s artistic practice. When growing up in a diaspora, memory is a crucial part of who you are. Her work is about experiencing a feeling of otherness and overcoming it through artistic practice that encompasses two aspects of diasporic story: missing and at the same time trying to remember the family’s history, culture and personal story. In the case of Kvet Nguyen, this story is told through photography.
Media:
How Does a Collective End? An Interview with Robert Gabris and Ľuboš Kotlár
Interview for Momus
Article for RomaMoMA Blog
PÄŤ & PÓL
We would like to invite you to the opening of the exhibition STILL HERE at Old Town Gallery Zichy in Bratislava, Slovakia, on 12th September, 2022 at 19:00. The group exhibition featuring work of Ksenia Bilyk (UA), Peter Brandt (DK), Amir Chasson (GB/IL), Artistka Chuprynenko (UA), Maika Dieterich (DE), Petra Garajová (SK), Charmaine de Heij (NL), Jena Jang (KR), Marc Lee (CH), Agata Milizia (IT), Petra Nela Pučeková (SK), Ojo Taiye (NG), will take place until 2nd October, 2022. The exhibition is curated by the civic association päť & pól (Oleksandra Bakushina, Lucia Gamanová, Kvet Nguyen, Eva Takácsová) and Denisa Tomková.
Opening: 12.09. 2022, 19:00
Exhibition: 13.09 - 2.10. 2022
Old Town Gallery Zichy, Ventúrska 265, Bratislava, Slovakia
Opening hours: Tuesday - Sunday, 15:00-19:00
The exhibition will be accompanied by a supporting programme:
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18.09.2022 at 20:00, as part of the White Night Bratislava, performance Spiritual Container by artist Jena Jang and with participation of Ivana Marína Hollá.
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30.09.2022, as part of the festival Zaži Zichy, performance by singer-songwriter Artistka Chuprynenho accompanied by a public discussion on the topic of cultural inclusion with the civic association Mareena.
Media:
Interview for the Third Text Online
