RECOMMENDED If Vietnam means carnage and devastation to you, think again. As Howard Henry Chen amply demonstrates in his lush large-format color photographs—some of which are paneled to simulate traditional Vietnamese lacquer paintings—the conflict-ridden past does live on, as preserved in tourist destinations. In Chen’s most telling image, two Western tourists sit on a bench at a picnic table at the War Remnants Museum, surrounded by American military hardware, with café umbrellas emblazoned with the Pepsi-Cola logo in the background and a gift shop right behind them. No doubt, Chen is ruthlessly selective, but his narrow pinpointed angle punctures any residual myths we might have that Vietnam has not determinedly entered the globalized capitalist travel market with hordes of kitschy golden Buddhas blazing for its citizens to admire and its foreign visitors to consume. (Michael Weinstein) Through October 13 at SCHNEIDER GALLERY
Related Stories
Repurposing AI: A Review of Stephanie Dinkins at Stamps Gallery While this show is timely for everyone, I consider its setting within a university art gallery and emerging tech hub like the city of Ann Arbor a subversive provocation which Dinkins invites the greater public—including members of the university community—to consider our own positionality to AI and technology.
Lost in Translation: A Review of Crip* at Gallery 400 The strongest works in the exhibition succinctly express the ways the artist relates to their own body while calling out how the artist’s body and body of work has been perceived or coded against norms or ideals.
