Vi vu

Video of silent and still images, reduplicated onomatopoeias and voice

Duration: 22:57 mins

2023

Vi vu in Vietnamese describes the sound of wind blowing and also means making a fun and carefree journey. Since I have lived abroad and learnt other languages, I got to see my mother tongue from different standpoints and become more fascinated by how musical and playful Vietnamese language is, exemplified poetically by rhyming compounds. „Vi vu“ is a collection of such words, but focus mainly on those who evoke sounds, i.e. Onomatopoeia. Each word is experienced in three ways: spoken by me, seen by the appearance of Vietnamese language on screen and by a series of still frames, some are my personal photos, some are found images in the public domain. These images although sometimes seemingly unrelated to each other are linked by the narrative of the onomatopoeia. I decided to accompany those images with „silence“ and „stillness“ so that the spectator can individually fill up their imagination with their own sounds and movements while looking at the images of significantly different situations and styles, letting their personal and social backgrounds unfold their narrative.

The process of looking for needed images was interesting for myself. I tried to „hear“ what I believe the word symbolizes and then searched for such images that match the sound in my mind. Sometimes the process is the other way round. Intriguing images „found“ me while I was searching for other matching images. I tried to imagine what I could hear from what I saw in the picture, and that depends on the dynamics of things, the landscape, the acoustic space, the distance to the sound sources, how realistic or imaginative the images are, how far back in time we are, etc. Looking at those images I find myself making a „Vi vu“ – a mental journey to the sound that I heard in the past as I believe we can only imagine sounds that we have already had in our memories.  

The word Onomatopoeia comes from Ancient Greek, onoma – “name” and poiein – „to make. It may have been the first form of human language, first human attempt to name things from the sounds they make, to represent and communicate what human perceived. Vietnamese language like any other language, has its own distinct way of symbolizing a sound or an idea. In this on-going „Vi vu“ journey, the way a sound is described, which image correspond to which sound is simply my personal choice, which is shaped by my cultural and social background. Another person with another mother tongue would perhaps have a completely different set of sounds and images and that manifests how beautiful the cultural difference is.

is a composition with Vietnamese tautogram recited by myself and its automatically Google translated version spoken by the robotic voice of Text-to-Speech function and my piano interpretation of Sarabande from Bach’s Cello Suite in C minor.

This work was born out of my ever-growing fascination with the musicality and playfulness of Vietnamese language. The Vietnamese tautogram poem recited here is written by starting every word with letter „B“. I’m curious to see what is lost and what is found in the translation process – meaning, connotation, expression, musicality … Some Vietnamese words are even wrongly translated but I decided to leave them as they are automatically translated. Sometimes when something goes „wrong“, we suddenly find new directions; perhaps not so different from many inventions that were created by „mistakes“.

At the heart of the work is the Sarabande that I personally love very much as it is so open and at the same time so profound. Yo-Yo Ma said this Sarabande is the soul of the whole suite. Mstislav Rostropovich described it as the essence of Bach’s genius. Paul Tortelier viewed it as an extension of silence. The first time I listened to it, I was astonished by how contemporary it sounded, as if it was written today although it was written about 300 years ago. I „translated“ it into the language of piano and hope that things are not only lost but also found.

In recent years I have been exploring how context brings meanings and how contextualization can change our perception and feelings. The Vietnamese tautogram, the automatic English translation, the music of Bach, each of them acts as a subject or as a context depending on the moment they are regarded and depending on the viewpoint, the personal and social background of the audience. 

The title of this work is drawn from a poem by Hàn Mặc Tử, written in his last year of life, at the age of 28.

„Ta sống mãi với trăng sao, gấm vóc

Trong nắng thơm, trong tiếng nhạc thần bay“

(Hàn Mặc Tử – from the poetry collection „Trường thọ“)

Automatic translation by Google

„I live forever with the brocade, moon and stars

In the fragrant sunshine, in the music of the flying god“

(Hàn Mặc Tử – from the poetry collection „To be long-lived“)