Personal notes: 

Vietnam is an agricultural producing country. Since ancient time, Vietnamese people had to rely on natural forces in order to maintain their agricultural production. With animism as well as the amalgamation of folk beliefs and Buddhist notions, for long, Vietnamese people worship natural forces as gods and deities. Specifically for agriculture, water is the most sacred element. Hence, there are numeral folk tales and theophanies in relation to the element of water. However, in modern life, after religious rituals, people discard the religious objects such as altars, ceramic incense holders and votive money ashes to natural sites, right back to places with the said sacred element. Instead of sending these objects to the assigned places for waste or finding a more sustainable alternative, they believe by doing so, it would prevent them from being disrespectful towards the holy. Therefore, lakes, rivers and other open water spaces became places for discarding religious waste objects. 

Beside the disappearance of several public water spaces in Hanoi – the city known for its unique network of ponds and lakes – due to urbanization and other pollution factors, religious waste is becoming a threat to the water environment. It poses a contradiction between Vietnamese traditional customs, religious rituals and behavior-belief system of modern life. Why do they persist on praying for a wealthier, more prosperous future  with excessive rituals and frivolous religious objects while destroying the very future of our planet?

Born and raised in Hanoi, I have a special attachment to the city’s lakes and ponds with early memories of sightseeing lakes with my parents. In front of my family house, there used to be two lakes situated within very close distance to each other (Hoang Cau lake and Dong Da lake). For some time back in the days, besides being a peaceful scenery, Hoang Cau lake was used as a site for artisans to soak buffaloes and cow bones in their crafting process. That degraded the water condition of the lake and created horrific odor. In 2010, Hoang Cau lake was landfilled due to urban city planning yet it remained a parking lot for several years. Eventually, it became the land for high-rises. Dong Da lake has a different fate. It is preserved yet beside its seemingly tranquil and idyllic outlook, it is also a site where people discard religious objects alongside daily waste. 

All these have inspired me to create this site-specific multimedia installation as a response to Citizen Earth(*). My work was installed in the main hall of Museum of Biology Hanoi inside University of Science where the mosaic-tile floor, the surrounding architectural and interior details took influence from Buddhist and Vietnamese folk symbols. The materiality of the mirror directly replicates water surfaces. However, each mirror has a specific symbol inspired from Buddhist and folk religions in Vietnam that was created through a process of destroying parts of the mirror surface with acid, leaving them transparent. I wanted to create the in-between space of contradictions. Between the alluring, glorified reflections of the historical details and the re-interpreted religious symbols on the mirrors; between the soothing sound work featured by Nhung Nguyen and the blurry traces of my destructive process left on the glass surfaces; between one’s praise and loyalty to the divine and one’s dependence on the endless cycle of greed and desire; between being human with traditions to follow and duties to the well-being of our planet. The audience were challenged in an unsettling state, in-between contrasting extremities and are invited to question while negotiating with the said contradictions. 

(*) Citizen Earth is the one-year year project by Six Space that brought together artists and researchers from various fields to broaden discussions on environmental awareness and encourage action for positive change in Vietnam with support from Goethe-Institut and Prince Claus Fund in 2020-2021