Join Dr. Alden Sajor Marte-Wood, Assistant Professor of English at Rice University, for a panel discussion with artists Anh Hà Bùi, Matt Manalo, Diane Severin Nguyen, and Preetika Rajgariah about transnational Asian identity formation and representation.
The contours of Asian diasporic experiences remain defined by myriad transnational crossings—at once social, political, and economic, but also, aesthetic. What are the various ways artists are addressing questions of transnational Asian identity in their work? What is the relationship between identity formation and visual culture? Dr. Alden Sajor Marte-Wood is joined by current exhibition artist Diane Severin Nguyen and local Houston artists Anh Hà Bùi, Matt Manalo, and Preetika Rajgariah for a panel discussion on the relationship between their respective art practices and the Asian diasporic experience in Texas.
This program is presented in conjunction with the exhibition, Diane Severin Nguyen: IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS, and Diane Severin Nguyen’s first public art commission, Not in this life (2023).
Ticket Information
RSVPs are encouraged as seating is limited.
Location and Accessibility
This event will take place in the Brown Foundation Gallery, located on the main level of the Museum.
Please review CAMH’s safety protocols here. Seating will be socially distanced and masks are encouraged throughout the event. If there are questions or concerns regarding safety or accessibility, please contact ytorres@camh.org.
About Anh Hà Bùi
Anh Hà Bùi is a visual artist and curator. Born in Hanoi, Vietnam and traveling to the United States at age 10, Anh uses art to investigate his body, experiences, and desires as he falls in tension with the dominant cultural conception of nationhood, race, and gender.
About Matt Manalo
Matt Manalo is a Houston-based artist who creates work involving elements of painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, and printmaking. In his practice, he uses raw materials and found objects as a means of environmental consciousness and understanding ideas of scarcity and abundance. Much of his work is centered on ideas of borders and displacement, exploring how “home” and identity should be defined as a first-generation immigrant from the Philippines. He received his BFA in Painting from the University of Houston. His work was recently featured in the 2021 exhibitions, Carriers: The Body as a Site of Danger and Desire at Blaffer Art Museum (Houston) and the 2021 Texas Biennial: A New Landscape, A Possible Horizon (New Braunfels). Manalo is also the founder of Filipinx Artists of Houston and runs the alternative art space Alief Art House.
About Diane Severin Nguyen
Diane Severin Nguyen is an artist who works with photography and time-based media. Nguyen earned an MFA from Bard College in 2020 and a BA from Virginia Commonwealth University in 2013. Recent solo and two-person exhibitions include Between Two Solitudes, Stereo (Warsaw); Tyrant Star (online exhibition), Carnegie Museum of Art (CMOA) (Pittsburgh); Reoccurring Afterlife, Empty Gallery (Hong Kong); Minor twin worlds with Brandon Ndife, Bureau (New York); and Flesh Before Body, Bad Reputation (Los Angeles); all 2019. Recent group exhibitions include Is it morning for you yet?: 58th Carnegie International, CMOA (Pittsburgh, 2022); Greater New York, MoMA PS1 (New York, 2021); Made in L.A. 2020: a version, Hammer Museum and The Huntington (Los Angeles 2020–2021); and Bodies of Water: 13th Shanghai Biennale, Power Station of Art (Shanghai, 2021).
About Preetika Rajgariah
Preetika Rajgariah is a multidisciplinary artist whose works examine the complicated intersections of cultural identity, race, and capitalism while referencing her traditional upbringing as an Indian born American. She received her MFA from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and is currently based in Houston. Rajgariah has held residencies at Ox-Bow School of Art (Saugatuck), ACRE (Steuben), Vermont Studio Center (VSC) (Johnson), and the School of Visual Arts (SVA) (New York). Rajgariah has also exhibited and performed in spaces such as Untitled Miami Basel, the Asia Society Texas Center, Roots & Culture, and the Donnelley Foundation (Chicago), SOMArts (San Francisco), Women & Their Work (Austin), and DiverseWorks (Houston).
About Alden Sajor Marte-Wood
Alden Sajor Marte-Wood is an Assistant Professor of English at Rice University. He is a cultural studies scholar whose work focuses on Global Asias and transnational political economy. At Rice, Alden teaches courses on Asian Anglophone and Asian American literatures, media studies, and cultural theory. He serves on the governing council for the Chao Center for Asian Studies and the steering committee for the Center for the Study of Women, Gender, and Sexuality.
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Image caption (left to right): Anh Hà Bui, Matt Manalo, Diane Severin Nguyen, and Preetika Rajgariah. All images courtesy the artists.
Support
CAMH’s presentation of Diane Severin Nguyen: IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS is supported in part by J. Patrick Collins.
Diane Severin Nguyen: IF REVOLUTION WAS A SICKNESS has been made possible by the patrons, benefactors and donors to CAMH’s Major Exhibition Fund: Chinhui Juhn and Eddie Allen, Sissy and Denny Kempner, MD Anderson Foundation, Rea Charitable Trust, Louisa Stude Sarofim, The Sarofim Foundation, and the Texas Commission on the Arts.
Diane Severin Nguyen’s first public art commission, which takes place in conjunction with the exhibition, is funded in part by the City of Houston via the Houston Arts Alliance.
Contemporary Arts Museum Houston is funded in part by the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance.
Arts and Culture Texas Magazine is the exclusive media sponsor of CAMH’s presentation of Diane Severin Nguyen: IF REVOLUTION IS A SICKNESS.