Dinh Q Lê’s family left Vietnam when he was 10, driven away by the intense fighting between Vietnam and Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge in the years immediately after the Vietnam War. Having fled in boats to Thailand, they eventually moved to the USA where Lê trained as an artist. He has since then returned to Vietnam, not just by moving back to the country but also by consistently excavating memories of its war-torn past through his art. In Erasure (2011), Lê draws from his own story to evoke the trauma and desperation of numerous people from across history who had to embark on treacherous journeys across the seas while fleeing violence. The installation includes a broken fishing boat and debris arranged on a floor covered with photographs. Viewers can examine these photographs which are part of an archive Lê has created from images left behind by Vietnamese families who fled the war. Flickering within this sea of memories is the video of a replica 19th century ship, such as the one used by European traders and explorers, burning on a beach. Lê here connects contemporary debates around immigrants and asylum seekers to a long history of travel across the seas. Perspectives shift and dissolve as the video progresses, illuminating the artefacts and invoking innumerable stories of violence, displacement and personal rupture that continue to unfold around us.
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