Only Your Name is a group exhibition at SLQS Gallery that explores the Vietnam war 50 years after the end of the conflict, featuring the work of Hoa Dung Clerget, Vicky Dõ and Duong Thuy Nguyen. Only Your Name opened for London Gallery Weekend.
What would they be without each other? (2024-25) by Duong Thuy Nguyen for SLQS Gallery. Image by Studio Adamson.
To me, Nguyen’s work takes a really unique angle on the war, erasure and remembrance, as it re-contextualizes a series of 35 mm photos taken in 1989 by Joan Wakelin, in which she “was offered two days’ work with the Hong Kong branch of Save the Children to document their work in four detention centres for Vietnamese refugees. She was permitted an hour to take photographs in each centre – San Yick, Sham Shui Po, Pillar Point and Tuen Mun. (Nyugen)”
Nguyen’s series of embossed aluminium works truly shines in this group show where she depicts these detention centres as they stood. The work feels didactic and authentic, not hierarchical, as her new series of work claims ‘if they survive, they are refugees’, which is both the name of the series and featured on the UNHCR’s poster depicted in the work below. These objects feel like a rare spot of honesty, where these small images are intentionally re-orientalised by the Duong’s hands.
A British photographer, she reclaims the landscape through her embossed aluminium, perspex, wood and wax bordered works. She takes the negatives, and revisits the period as a space for reclamation, and retelling, particularly homing in on the immigrant experience of the refugees so dramatically affected by the war.
The sea feeds and kills (2024-25) by Duong Thuy Nguyen for SLQS Gallery. Image by Studio Adamson.
The works feel incredibly tactile and deserve to be seen in person, because the claustrophobia of being entrapped in these images is heavily dependent on the textures of these works. Particularly with the work Behind the incubative undercurrent, seen below, you feel trapped, looking at the gated fence of the refugee centre. The camps depicted in Nguyen’s aluminium works include chain-link fences only made more real by the metal indentures. Duong’s series capitalizes on the uncomfortable journey of child refugees and immigration. Another challenging element within the series is the quote ‘they are learning English because it is the future’. This engraved text feels as if the conformity of linguistics traps the children, along with the physicality of the refugee centre.
Behind the incubative undercurrent (2024-25) by Duong Thuy Nguyen for SLQS Gallery. Image by Studio Adamson.
Nguyen’s series asks uncomfortable questions, as she depicts two children being bathed by an unknown adult. The artist asked questions when looking at the photographs which were unanswerable at the time showing just how little is invested in the immigrant experience, particularly when working with young children.
Go wash yourself (2024-25) by Duong Thuy Nguyen for SLQS Gallery. Image by Studio Adamson.
Duong’s work is therefore incredibly poignant and relevant, because it confronts the world’s ever shifting dialogue around immigration, how poorly people who are being processed are treated. It is both interesting and saddening to see how little has changed many years later. A lot of these issues surrounding refugees and immigration persist, and are only increasing in relevance- not just in Hong-Kong (where the refugee centres were) and Vietnam, but globally. And thus, I conclude that this show serves as a beginning of the ever-evolving discussion on immigration. As such, it should not to be missed.
Only Your Name 6th June – 12th July 2025
SLQS Gallery
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Rayya Fadlo Khuri (b. 1998) is a Lebanese-American London-based artist and writer, who has been published in In Between Knots, Skin Deep and Talk Magazine, as well as shown in TM Lighting Gallery, Forma and been awarded by UN DP. Khuri attended Pratt Institute for a BFA in Painting with a minor in Writing & Literature and Art History, and attended Central State Martins for a MA in Fine Arts. she returns twice at Artforum under Melissa Mudry as a publications intern. She writes for Fad Magazine and loves a good show, more information on her practice can be found on her instagram @rayyakhuri.