# @drawingcenter on Instagram

- **Type:** Image
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/BhPYA4XBMTD
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/16046004-drawingcenter-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/thumbnails/24e510e6d0.jpg
- **Posted:** 2018-04-06T19:10:42.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** The Drawing Center (@drawingcenter) — https://gondola.cc/drawingcenter

## Caption

Artists have a variety of methods to make their mark. Every Friday we will share a photograph of an #ArtistInAction. 〰️
Danh Vo (b. 1975) is a Vietnamese-born Danish conceptual artist whose works and installations explore global narratives and his own personal history. Vo expands the traditional role of an artist by using found objects, similar to a readymade, and altering them somewhat. For example, Vo used castoff cardboard boxes that were used to ship standard consumer goods like beer, cereal, and milk, and his father, a skilled calligrapher, covered the logos and brand names with gold leaf. Vo’s own craftsmanship is completely absent from the final artwork, yet he directed the object’s transformation from something worthless to valuable. Vo constantly plays with the concept of value in his work including the personal meaning attached to certain possessions. Born in Vietnam, Vo and his family fled the country in 1979 and lived in a refugee camp in Singapore before moving to Denmark. He pays tribute to this time in his family’s history in “Oma Totem”, a work that is a stacked washing machine, refrigerator, TV, and wooden crucifix; items that his grandmother received from relief organizations when she settled in Germany. Vo explicates the exploitation of non-Western countries as part of his found object practice. He displayed a pre-Columbian serpent’s head that was loaned to Paramount Pictures from the Mexican government in 1926 that was excised by the film executives in order for the object to fit their display needs. Vo displayed the artifact’s hole to demonstrate Western violence against other cultures. “Danh Vo: Take My Breath Away”, a survey of Vo’s work, is on-view now through May 9 at the Guggenheim Museum. guggenheim 
#DanhVo

Image: via Xavier Hufkens gallery.

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## Tags

artistinaction, danhvo

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