From the organizer: Panel Discussion

Sàn Art in Collaboration with Salon Saigon
Language: English and Vietnamese

RSVP: info@salonsaigon.com

Challenging Stories: Contemporary Responses to the Legacies of War:
Anthea Gunn, Mai Nguyen Thi Thanh, James Nguyen and Angela Tiatia.

Chaired by Brian Curtin.

A panel of artists and curator Anthea Gunn discuss contemporary art commissions at the Australian War Memorial (AWM) in Canberra that explore the legacies of conflict in the Asia-Pacific region and with a focus on a current project in Vietnam.

One of a series of partnerships with organizations in Vietnam, Singapore, Papua New Guinea and South Korea, the AWM invited an artist from each country to spend four weeks in residence at the AWM, and Australian artists to spend four weeks in each partner country, exploring the experiences and legacy of war. The artists then create works of art in response to the residency, which brings a new international scope to the AWM collection. 

Artists Mai Nguyen Thi Thanh (VN) and James Nguyen (AUS) will speak about their recently completed residencies in Australia and Vietnam further to a collaboration between AWM, Sàn Art and A. Farm, ahead of creating their works. Angela Tiatia (AUS) will speak about her work The Fall, completed in 2017 for AWM after a residency in Singapore. And AWM Senior Curator of Art Anthea Gunn will speak about commissioning works of art in response to challenging and complex subject matter and the role of art at the AWM.

Dr Anthea Gunn is Senior Curator of Art at the Australian War Memorial, Canberra. She completed a PhD in art history for her thesis ‘Imitation, Realism and Australian Art in 2010’ at the ANU. Her thesis considered the artists known as the ‘Imitation Realists’ in the 1960s and examined their work in the context of local, national and international art. She has worked as a social history curator at the National Museum of Australia (2008-13) and has published in the Journal of Australian Studies, the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Art, Museum and Eyeline magazines, the Canberra Times and The Conversation, amongst others. She has worked on exhibitions including the Landmarks gallery and Glorious Days: Australia 1913 at the NMA and the online exhibition Art of Nation at the AWM. She has extensive experience commissioning major works of art and is currently leading a program to commission artists from the Asia-Pacific responding to the shared histories of conflict in the region.