18.10.1860
2013
Colour gravure, Somerset White Satin 300 gr.
49 x 37.5 cm (19 5/16 x 14 3/4 in.)
A copy of a 19th century photograph, 18.10.1860 shows one of the five Pekinese dogs seized during the sacking of the Summer Palace in Beijing in 1860. The dog was found in a cupboard and given to Queen Victoria, who ironically named it Looty. This archive has not been altered by Danh Vo. An unusual story, it hides a collective fraught with political issues.
Danh Vo combines photographs and various artefacts to show the power of objects with a significant historical charge. As in 18.10.1860, he lets them speak for themselves. Looty, slumped in his chair, reveals the painful story not only of colonisation, but also of the movement, sometimes due to uprooting, of people and goods. Like a hidden critique, the artist makes this image the receptacle of a traumatic reality, that of his own escape from Vietnam in his childhood.
Danh Vo's photograph 18.10.1860 was shown for the first time by the Pinault Collection in 2015 at the exhibition "Slip of the Tongue" at the Punta della Dogana.
Danh Vo combines photographs and various artefacts to show the power of objects with a significant historical charge. As in 18.10.1860, he lets them speak for themselves. Looty, slumped in his chair, reveals the painful story not only of colonisation, but also of the movement, sometimes due to uprooting, of people and goods. Like a hidden critique, the artist makes this image the receptacle of a traumatic reality, that of his own escape from Vietnam in his childhood.
Danh Vo's photograph 18.10.1860 was shown for the first time by the Pinault Collection in 2015 at the exhibition "Slip of the Tongue" at the Punta della Dogana.
Exhibitions
Danh Vo © Adagp, Paris.
Courtesy Niels Borch Jensen.
Photo: Jørgen Strüwing
