Stephen Nguyen‘s installation at Suyama Space, Migration, is a stage set that aspires to be a play. Instead, it’s a proposal for a play, an idea roughed out on a three-dimensional drawing board: Trace evidence of birds bursting through a drywall constructed for the purpose. Plot hangs heavy on Nguyen’s hands, but he is unable to give flesh to its outline. Nguyen is thinking, but not with his hands.
Nguyen, Migration, detail, 2010
Nguyen’s best installations derive from teamwork with Wade Kavanaugh, who had his own solo show at Suyama Space in 2008. (Examples here.)
A lot of punching through the wall takes place in the name of painting. (See Target Practice: Painting Under Attack, 1949-78. Nguyen pales next to these primary sources.)
Nguyen at Suyama through Aug. 6.
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