Mathuật – MMRBX
Maithu Bùi
2-channel video-installation, color, sound, 22’, salt.
Commissioned by the 12th Berlin Biennale, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2022).
Mathuật is a virtual diaspora of intergenerational memories. The work metaphorically links the Vietnamese ritual of caring for the dead with an allegorical and virtual memory box that stores mnemonic moving images. The installation functions as a Vietnamese water puppet theatre, utilizing its ancient methods of storytelling and knowledge dissemination to preserve historical narratives.
Vietnamese Mathuật (“magic”) = ma ("ghost") + thuật (“craft”), is the art to communicate with ghosts. MMRBX is an acronym for the working term “memory box", which simulates the diaspora of memories. Through choirs and other storytelling devices, the work evokes a sense of intergenerational continuity, where stories begin and end through ghostly encounters. The work metaphorically links the Vietnamese ritual of caring for the dead with an allegorical and virtual memory box that preserves mnemonic moving images.
Mathuật–MMRBX is a virtual diaspora of intergenerational memories. The work metaphorically links the Vietnamese ritual of caring for the dead with an allegorical and virtual memory box that stores mnemonic moving images. The installation functions as a Vietnamese water puppet theatre, utilizing its ancient methods of storytelling and knowledge dissemination to preserve historical narratives. Vietnamese Mathuật (“magic”) = ma ("ghost") + thuật (“craft”), is the art to communicate with ghosts. MMRBX is an acronym for the working term "memory box", which simulates the diaspora of memories.
Through choirs and other storytelling devices, the work evokes a sense of intergenerational continuity, where stories begin and end through ghostly encounters. The work metaphorically links the Vietnamese ritual of caring for the dead with an allegorical and virtual memory box that preserves mnemonic moving images.