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Fundraising Event

DVAN held its first fundraising event on Saturday May 22, 6-9pm at Andrew Lam's Infinity condominium in San Francisco, CA. There was a silent auction of artwork, signed books and movies generously donated by artists in our community. Andrew Lam, author of Perfume Dreams, and Aimee Phan, author of We Should Never Meet, read from their work, along with upcoming artists. Monies raised will go to the continuation of our activities.



See a bigger version of the flyer here, or see a short video describing some of the items that were on sale, either on youtube (text easier to read if you click on full screen) or right below:

Poetry

DVAN organized the second San Francisco Vietnamese American Poetry Festival, again as part of the SF International Poetry Festival (in collaboration with the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library). The event took place on April 24 2010 in the Fleet Room of Fort Mason Buidling D. A reception followed at the bookstore in Building C.

Our program included Anh Vu Buchanan, Kim-An Lieberman, Lan Tran, Trinh T. Minh-Ha, Andrew Lam and Dao Strom. Viet Nguyen served as emcee. See the flyer here.

Festival Sponsors: The SF International Poetry Festival, The Center for SEA Studies at UCB, The Asian American Studies Department and The Vietnamese American Studies Center at SFSU, and the Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center (APICC). Reception Sponsors: Restaurant “Le Cheval” and Froyo & Crepe Cafe.

Emcee

Viet Thanh Nguyen is an associate professor of English and American Studies & Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, and the author of Race and Resistance: Literature and Politics in Asian America (Oxford University Press, 2002). He has received residencies or scholarships from the Fine Arts Work Center, the Djerassi Resident Artists Program, the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard. His short fiction has been published in Manoa, Orchid: A Literary Review, Best New American Voices 2007, A Stranger Among Us: Stories of Cross-Cultural Collision and Connection, Narrative, and Gulf Coast, where his story won the 2007 Fiction Prize.

Poets & Writers

Anhvu Buchanan's poems have appeared or are forthcoming in 580 Split, William and Mary Review, Boston Literary Magazine, Cream City Review, and Parthenon West Review. He is the first place winner of the 2009 Barbie Cage Haiku. He is currently pursuing his MFA in Creative Writing at San Francisco State University and working on his thesis/first book on psychological disorders. He lives in San Francisco and co-curates the Living Room Reading series with poet Ric Delia.

Andrew Lam is the author of the memoir - “Perfume Dreams: Reflections on the Vietnamese Diaspora” (heyday books – 2005) and an editor with New America Media. His next book, “East Eats West: Writing in Two Hemispheres” (Heyday Books – 2010) is due out in the Fall 2010.Lam’s essays have appeared widely in many newspapers and magazines, including The Nation, LA Times, and he has provided some 60 commentaries on All Things Considered. His book of short stories, “Birds of Paradise” is due out in 2011. Besides essays, his short stories are widely published

Kim-An Lieberman is a writer of Vietnamese and Jewish American descent, born in Rhode Island and raised in the Pacific Northwest. She holds a Ph.D. in English from the University of California, Berkeley. Her debut collection of poetry, Breaking the Map, was published in 2008 by Blue Begonia Press. Her poems and essays have also appeared in Poetry Northwest, Prairie Schooner, Quarterly West, ZYZZYVA, CALYX, Threepenny Review, and the anthology Asian America.Net: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Cyberspace. A recipient of awards from the Jack Straw Writers Program and the Mellon Foundation for the Humanities, as well as a finalist for the 2009 Stranger Genius Award in Literature, she has been a featured reader at venues including Seattle's Richard Hugo House, Portland's Wordstock Festival, and the Asian American Writers' Workshop in New York. She currently teaches writing and literature, grades 9 through 12, at Lakeside School in Seattle.

Dao Strom has published two books of fiction, Grass Roof, Tin Roof (2003) and The Gentle Order of Girls and Boys (2006), and released two albums, Send Me Home (2004) and Everything That Blooms Wrecks Me (2008). She has received a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship, a James Michener Fellowship, and First Prize in The Chicago Tribune Nelson Algren Award; she performed at the 2006 South by Southwest Music Festival and the 12th Annual Woody Guthrie Folk Festival. Her music and literature have been featured on KQED's "Pacific Time" and WNYC's Leonard Lopate Show. Dao currently resides in Portland, Oregon where she is at work on a narrative song-cycle, Requiem for the Migration & Mother(land)songs, and a third book of prose.

Lan Tran is the writer/performer of three off-Broadway shows, "How to Unravel Your Family," which played to a sold-out audience in the Lincoln Center Theater-produced American Living Room Festival, and "Elevator/Sex" and "SmartAss," which both premiered in New York at the West End Theatre. Her work has also been featured on NPR, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall's REDCAT Theater, and the Ford Amphitheatre Complex. Lan has published short fiction, creative nonfiction, playwriting and poetry in various anthologies and literary journals, most recently A New Literary History of American (Harvard University Press, 2009). She is currently working on two screenplay Mediocre Poker and Sparkly Things.

Trinh T. Minh-ha is a filmmaker, writer, academic and composer. The recipient of several awards and grants (including the “Trailblaizers” Award at MIPDOC, Cannes; the AFI National Independent Filmmaker Maya Deren Award, fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment of the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, the American Film Institute, The Japan Foundation, and the California Arts Council), her films have been given thirty-six retrospectives in the US, the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, Slovenia, France, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Japan and Hong Kong, and were exhibited at the international contemporary art exhibition Documenta 11 (2002) in Germany. They have shown widely in the States, in Canada, Senegal, Australia, and New Zealand, as well as in Europe and Asia (including in Italy, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Japan, India, Taiwan, Jerusalem,. Reassemblage was exhibited at The New York Film Festival (1983) and has toured the country with the Asian American Film Festival among other festivals. Naked Spaces received the Blue Ribbon Award for Best Experimental Feature at the American Int'l. Film Festival and the Golden Athena Award for Best Feature Documentary at the Athens International Film Festival in 1986; it toured nationally and internationally with the 1987 Biennial of the Whitney Museum of American Art. Surname Viet Given Name Nam has received the Merit Award from the Bombay International Film Festival, the Film as Art Award from the Society for the Encouragement of Contemporary Art (SF Museum of Modern Art) and the Blue Ribbon Award at the American Film and Video Festival. Shoot for the Contents won the Jury's Best Cinematography Award at the 1992 Sundance Film Festival and the Best Feature Documentary Award at the Athens International Film Festival, and toured internationally with the 1993 Biennale of the Whitney Museum. A Tale of Love, has shown internationally in over twenty-four film festivals, including Berlin and Toronto. The Fourth Dimension (Locarno, Viennale, Edinburg, London) and Night Passage continue to exhibit widely (UK, Austria, Spain, Japan, Korea, Shanghai).


Dao Strom


Trinh T. Minh-Ha


Lan Tran

DVAN co-sponsored the West Coast premiere of "Don't Burn," a film by Viet Nam's premier director, Dang Nhat Minh, based on the bestseller "The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram" (translated into English as "Last Night I Dreamed of Peace"). Dang Nhat Minh was present, as was Doan Hoang, who screened her documentary "Oh, Saigon!"

Dang Nhat Minh continued his West Coast tour with DVAN sponsored or co-sponsored film screenings at San Francisco State, UC Berkeley, and De Anza College.

DVAN Advisory Board member Viet Le will be speaking at Asian American Artists in California , a symposium presented by the UCLA Asian American Studies Center and the Hammer Museum, Saturday, March 14, 2009, from 9:00am - 1:00pm at the Armand Hammer Museum. This event is free and open to the public. RSVP is requested. Please call (310) 825-2974 or
e-mail aascrsvp@aasc.ucla.edu by March 13, 2009.




This symposium will celebrate the publication of the landmark Asian American Art: A History, 1850-1970, edited by Gordon H. Chang, Mark Johnson, and Paul Karlstrom, as well as present the dynamic work of three present-day artists in southern California. Asian American Art: A History is the first comprehensive study of more than 150 early artists in the United States before 1970. Artists of Asian ancestry have received little historical attention, even though many of them received wide critical acclaim during their productive years. This pioneering work recovers the impressive artistic production of numerous Asian Americans, and brings to light their extraordinary range of vision and media. Amazon.com is giving a 34% discount (only $26.37 instead of $39.95) AND free shipping for this book. Purchase ahead for the best deal.

On one panel, contemporary artists Reanne Estrada, Yong Soon Min, and Viet Le discuss their work within a transnational context. Reanne Estrada reflects on the Galleon Trade project, a series of exhibitions and programs highlighting the linkages among the Philippines, Mexico and California. Yong Soon Min-decolonial art activist and scholar-will speak about her projects, including "transPOP: Korea Viet Nam Remix," co-curated with Viet Le, an artist and creative writer who examines memory, AIDS and representation in Southeast Asia and its diasporas. Download the full press release.

Vietnamese Americans are far from the only people living in lands distant from their countries of origin or heritage. There are many other people with whom Vietnamese Americans may not share a common ancestry, but with whom they share common experiences of civil war, revolution, persecution, migration, exile, loss, displacement, cultural adjustment, and global citizenship. These shared experiences are important to Vietnamese American literature and art, and on February 5, 2009, DVAN Executive Director Isabelle Thuy Pelaud will speak about them with other artists and critics at the 2nd Iranian Literary Arts Festival.

The roundtable in which Isabelle will participate is "30 Years of Belonging." Tickets are free!

DVAN is proud to help sponsor transPOP: Korea Vietnam Remix. A rare opportunity to view cutting-edge contemporary art by critically acclaimed artists from three countries whose works explore representations of modernity and popular culture, transPOP features 16 artists from Vietnam and Korea and their respective diasporas in the United States.



Attend one or all of the four special, upcoming events that are a part of transPOP:

1. Curators’ Tour, Saturday, Jan. 31, 2p, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts :: 701 Mission Street, San Francisco, 94103-3138 • Free w/ Gallery Admission
general programs
tickets for tour

2. Short Film & Video Screening, Saturday, Jan. 31, 8.30-11.30p (looping), Screening Room, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts • FREE

Part of What’s the Big Idea? Night Party, 9p-midnight: link

3. Artists InSight - transPOP Artists In Conversation, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
Friday, Feb. 13, 6:30p • Screening Room/Galleries • Free w/ Gallery Admission

transPop: Korea Vietnam Remix exhibition artists Lan Thao Lam and Sowon Kwon join curators Viet Le and Yong Soon Min in conversation about their work, the creative process, and how they navigate their relationship to Vietnam, Korea, and the United States.

4. transPOP Symposium, Saturday, Feb. 14, 10a-5p, University of California, Berkeley, Institute of East Asian Studies Conference Room :: 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor, Berkeley, CA 94720 • FREE

Institute of East Asian Studies website (host & symposium details)
YBCA (schedule)

DVAN recently staged its first major event, Vietnamese Poets of the Diaspora, as part of the San Francisco International Poetry Festival. This highly successful event featured poets Mong Lan, Anh Hoa, Bao Phi, lê thi diem thúy, Linh Dinh, and Truong Tran, with DVAN's Executive Director Isabelle Thuy Pelaud as the master of ceremonies. Read more about this event in English or in Vietnamese. Photos from this evening can be seen here.



DVAN Executive Director Isabelle Thuy Pelaud and the six writers featured at DVAN's "Vietnamese Poets of the Diaspora" on November 8, 2008. Photo courtesy of Thai Anh Nguyen-Khoa.

About the writers:

Ánh Hoà:
A graduate of Mills College with a MFA in Creative Writing, she was awarded the Mary Merritt Henry Prize in Poetry and the Ardella Mills Literary Composition Prize in Creative Non-Fiction. Her work has been published in many literary journals. She has performed at The Kearny Street Workshop, among others.

Mộng Lan:
A poet, writer, painter, photographer and tango dance, she graduated with a MFA from the University of Arizona. She received a Wallace E. Stegner Fellowship in poetry at Stanford University and a Fulbright Scholarship to Việt Nam. Her work has been anthologized in Best American Poetry and published in various literary magazines. (website)

lê thi diem thúy:
Born in Phan Thiết, Việt Nam, she and her father left the country in 1978 by boat, eventually settling in Southern California. Her first novel, The Gangster We Are All Looking For, was published to great acclaim in 2003; she is at work on her second book. (website)

Bảo Phi:
He has been a performing poet since 1991 and a two-time Minnesota Grand Slam champion and a National Poetry Slam finalist. He appeared on HBO’S Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry. His work has appeared in the 2006 Best American Poetry anthology. (website)

Linh Đinh:
Born in Việt Nam in 1963, he came to the United States in 1975 and sojourned in Việt Nam in 2005. He has lived in Italy and England and is the author of two collections of stories, Fake House and Blood and Soap, and four books of poems. His novel, Love Like Hate, will be release in 2009 by Seven Stories Press. (website)

Trường Trần:
A poet and visual artist, his published work include The Book of Perception, Placing the Accents, and dust and conscience (winner of the 2000 San Francisco Poetry Center Book Prize). He teaches at San Francisco State University and Mills College. (website)