» WITHIN AND BEYOND: A TAXONOMY IN EXHIBITION-MAKING

Nguyễn Art Foundation (NAF) proudly presents Within & Beyond: A Taxonomy in Exhibition-making, a year-long educational and curatorial initiative conceived by Vicky Do, with the participation of Le Anh Thu, Nguyen Vo Bao Han and Nhi Phan.

An exhibition is often understood as the culmination of curatorial endeavour – the moment when dispersed references, concepts, intuitions, negotiations, and encounters are translated into tangible form. An exhibition, upon its realization, thus marks a moment of maturation within a curator’s process of inquiry and meaning-making. What could be more exhilarating than stepping into a space where abstractions are translated into materiality, occupying the space with their own breath, weight, and presence? Through exhibition-making, these concepts acquire a life of their own, escaping the creator’s ambition to give them meaning, while gradually falling onto the shoulders of the audience, who will prolong their life beyond the exhibition space. In this sense, concepts continue to evolve through different eyes, are carried on by different bodies, eventually taking on different forms over time. The ability to confidently let go of one’s initial intentions – releasing thought into the world, and allowing ideas to transform, fracture, and grow beyond their point of origin – perhaps marks a crucial moment of maturity for an exhibition maker.

What, then, does exhibition-making actually entail? Beyond supporting artists and organizing displays, can curating itself, be considered a process of artistic and intellectual production, a form of co-creation? If exhibitions produce knowledge, emotions, and social relations, how might we begin to understand and classify the labour of the curator – not only as mediator, but also as researcher, writer, spatial thinker, educator, and co-author? 

Exploring the different phases and methodologies of meaning-making through exhibitions, Within & Beyond: A Taxonomy in Exhibition-making, approaches these questions via the notion of the “Survey of Landscape” – the central framework for this year’s edition. Traditionally associated with scientific classification – the mapping of lands, environments, settlements, and ecological formations – taxonomy here is expanded toward and through cultural, political, emotional, and speculative perspectives. No longer merely a physical site, landscape becomes a structure through which ideologies, histories, economies, spiritualities, and human relationships unfold. To survey a landscape, therefore, is also to examine the systems and people that shape visibility, belonging, displacement, and imagination.  

Across one year, the three chosen participants – Le Anh Thu, Nguyen Vo Bao Han and Nhi Phan – will receive direct mentorship and professional support from the NAF team and external practitioners through discussions, workshops, studio visits, and field research designed specifically for the program. The premise of the project proposes curators not as figures of fixed authorities, but as learners of exhibition-making itself, with exhibitions functioning as evolving theses rather than finalized statements. Across the year, four interconnected theses will unfold, each responding to, reacting against, and expanding upon the previous one. Beginning with Vicky Do’s inaugural thesis-exhibition in July 2026, subsequent chapters will emerge every three months in the form of exhibitions, writings, and educational programs, creating an ongoing chain of critical exchange and collective inquiry.  
 

Organizer

Educational Partner