Iris Sa Phượng Nguyễn's works transport visitors into a world perpetually the colors of twilight. Her debut solo show, "Where Shadows Breathe," curated by Đỗ Tường Linh, presents a new mythology inspired by Vietnamese womanhood. Surreal and dreamlike, her works portray convenings of women and their trusted companions: storks, ducks, flowers and plants, in imagined spaces that defy the orders of objective reality. Each of her scenes carries an allegorical story, like a fairy-tale book or a document of ancient wisdom. The paintings rest within silver, glittery wooden frames, meant to evoke starry night skies or rippling moonlit waters. Wooden planks curve like streams, where Iris Sa’s painted ceramics float.
I am rarely ever so touched by paintings, but my visit to the exhibition was different. I was astounded by Iris Sa’s unique visual language and the totality of her fantastical world. I jumped at the chance to speak to the artist in mid-October, right after her first public conversation. Iris Sa dove into painting headfirst, without any formal training. What she did have in abundance was the courage to explore deep within herself, and an unapologetic dedication to her artistic desires.
Exhibit view at "Khi bóng tối thở" (When Shadows Breathe).
Iris Sa started painting at the end of 2022, when she was still a fashion student at a private academy. For a class exhibit, she designed a garment with the Henri Matisse prints she was obsessed with at the time. She also made four 50-by-70 paintings to supplement her installation. These works may seem modest in size compared to those adorning the walls at Mo Art Space, but they allowed her to learn her way around painting on canvases.
“I always liked painting, but never thought I would ever pursue it,” she said. By the start of 2023, she was taking adult painting lessons at a small academy named Artpink, and making her first sketches. Iris Sa seemed to leap past any uncertainty or reservation that could plague a beginner, let alone one without any formal, official training in the form. Those first sketches led to the paintings that are included in her debut show, Where Shadows Breathe. “Everything felt natural. I love working with large canvases”, Iris Sa remarked gleefully. “I love a challenge, and a chance for exploration.” She divulged that gradually, she skipped sketching altogether: “If I had an idea in my head, I would immediately start painting on canvas. I find it more enriching than sketching. It's like I'm building a house from scratch.”
Exhibit view at "Khi bóng tối thở" (When Shadows Breathe).
Iris Sa seemed sincerely amused by how much she gravitated towards large canvases from the start. I personally was more in awe. Venture into the vast blankness of an empty canvas, and filling it with colors and shapes until a world takes shape requires a full-body commitment. I imagine Iris Sa, brush in hand, crouching and soaring in her studio, wielding her whole body to paint as if choreographing dance. I imagine her last brushstroke completely engulfing her in a reality that was once only intuition.
Throughout our conversation, I realized that the relationship between inspiration and creation, for Iris Sa, is not a one-way street. Her paintings usually start with an emotion; sometimes it is a hunch she has for a painting, sometimes it comes from reminiscence. This spontaneity allows her to act on a thought or sentiment before it arrives at any rational recognition. Sometimes, she has to constantly motivate herself to finish a painting before the emotion becomes too heavy to dive into. There were some paintings that, once finished, she struggled to look at again. Others, she could not stop looking at, pacing back and forth in front of, in disbelief that she went through an experience so intense. Painting, for her, is a means of both processing and release. She may emerge from them as if from a portal, unrecognizable to herself once having crossed to the other side.
Giữa da thịt và giấc mơ (Between flesh and dream).
As she paints, Iris Sa’s heart quiets, the inciting emotion having morphed into shapes, figures, and backgrounds. At the center of her painting is usually a woman, her protagonist, bearing an animal mask. The woman is usually either pregnant or holding a newborn. Her belly is often swollen, her hips expanded, her breasts full. For Iris Sa, a woman in pregnancy is sacred. It is a state of anticipation and continuation; the image already carries momentum forward into the future. By including such a figure, Iris Sa imbues the work with a sense of hope that may distill any heaviness that inspired the scene in the first place.
The association with pregnancy in the paintings also invites a sense of mythology on the paintings. They resemble origin stories, primordial and organic, as if dated from a time before clothes. The women absorb fully what surrounds them through their skin, and they become one with the elements. In their nudity, they are fluid, slipping in and out of human form, dissolving any boundaries separating them from animals and nature. The motifs of storks and ducks, however, ground us in the Vietnamese cultural imagination. Iris Sa shared that they were animals from her upbringing, familiar creatures in Vietnamese rural scenes. She chose them because they were already cultural symbols in their own right. “They feel simple and unembellished, nothing too luxurious or too idiosyncratic or artsy. But they also feel intimate in their essence, and I think it is just enough. I like simple images that I could add onto as I paint.”
Sự nở rộ thiêng liêng (Sacred Bloom).
The play between the strange and the familiar is where Iris Sa’s paintings hold the most intrigue. Storks typically embody a notion of womanhood characterized by sacrifice, patience, and concern for others’ well-being at the expense of oneself. In many ways, we have come to expect representation of these traits in any depiction of Vietnamese women as well. They, storks and women, must be pure, gentle, and industrious. This symbol, however, occasionally fails to account for the complications of womanhood. Women are expected to take on both the physical labor of making a living and caring for children and elders, and the emotional labor of anticipating others’ needs, swallowing any complaints, and being delightful company in both domestic and social contexts. By matching women to a symbol, society takes for granted their agency. However, in Iris Sa’s paintings, agency is at the core. She not only portrays women in command of their actions, but also in command of making their worlds. For instance, the scene Sự Nở Rộ Thiêng Liêng (The Sacred Bloom) is crowded with women with their babies lounging amongst blooming lotuses. Lotus, too, symbolizes purity in Vietnamese culture. Here, the lotus centerpiece feels closer to fecundity, the joy of abundance and the revelry of feminine company. While referencing Vietnamese motifs like lotus or stork, the painting also resembles a Renaissance scene, perhaps of the Roman goddess birthing Diana and her nymphs.
Iris Sa also has agency on her mind when she imagines the viewers of her paintings. I, similar to many visitors, inquired about the masks worn by almost all of her main figures. “I like the idea that the women I paint do not emote in a specific way. Once adorned with the mask, no one could tell if you're sad or happy. I want them to exist in this space of uncertainty.” I find this insistence on privacy to be quite powerful. As viewers, we are asked to hold our judgement in suspense; the masks allude to public instances where women rarely get a say in how they show or hide feelings because others’ expectations for proper conduct may take precedence. Iris Sa went further: “I do not want to dictate these emotions to the viewer. I grant them the right to decipher these women's emotions via their own emotions. If you are looking at this painting, and what is unfolding makes you sad, then you feel like the woman is sad. If the scene excites you, then the woman looks exuberant to you. I want the viewer to experience those emotions themselves directly.” Her answer illuminates the role of what we bring into an art-viewing experience, which is never straightforward, always sentimental. I think about the intensity of emotions that play out in Iris Sa’s painting process. I wonder if it is like an offering that we, as viewers, respond to with our honest self-reflection and vulnerability that arises from experiencing their works.
Gương huyễn mộng (The mirror of illusions).
Iris Sa was pleasantly surprised that visitors have found the exhibit to be quite healing. They are able to detect the trace of intensity in her paintings, but the world she created healed them instead of replicating any harm. I asked Iris Sa if she herself had experienced any reflection on femininity and womanhood that would have been impossible without creating the work. l. She recounted harboring a lot of emotional conflicts before, including being plagued by nagging dissatisfaction. She felt as if she lacked a thorough understanding of life, questioning endlessly the facts of her family, the endurance of women around her, and her past. She was anxious and guarded, her worries and fears barring her from truly empathizing with others at times. Her painting process gradually calmed these agitations and stabilized her emotions. As she started painting depictions of women in compromising states, in hardship or even misery, she came to understand that people may have their own rationales for staying or leaving situations. Painting widened her horizons and enabled her to put herself into their shoes and imagine their dilemmas. This horizon also includes the perspective of men, who may also be faced with tough choices. “I no longer harbor that aggression; I am able to release it. With greater understanding comes greater love and compassion for others, because I may witness these hardships, but I am not going through them myself,” Iris Sa concluded.
She also walked away with more compassion for herself. “I used to put myself into rigid boxes regarding what I deserve according to what I can achieve. But all women have the right to be loved, and I should love myself as well. I looked back and was able to make peace. It may not seem grand, but it is another step towards maturity for me.” I think there is something universally recognizable in Iris Sa’s search for peace and reconciliation via an expressive pursuit. Just as she might not recognize the product of her own mind after finishing a painting, art may take us to a strange place where we can examine the conditions of our reality. Regardless of the conclusion, art arms us with the courage to imagine a kinder existence. Artistic processes may be solitary, but their impacts canbe collective. Before changes are possible, new worlds can be found in art, with artists serving as companions in our aspirations.
Exhibit view at "Khi bóng tối thở" (When Shadows Breathe).
These days, Iris Sa says she looks forward to returning to her everyday life. This means, going to her daily Fashion job, and resuming painting after a month’s hiatus. This also means enjoying early morning walks around the West Lake, and continuing on her endless quest for knowledge and inspiration. She has been reading more about other Asian cultures and the way they are intertwined, seeking new images and resonances. I am thrilled to see what Iris Sa conjures next, as she departs from her own stories and weaves in others, potentially many millennia and lands away.
