Twinning

A curator’s look at le brothers’ life and practice.

- Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani

My first encounter with LE Brothers was in Paris at the opening of ‘Secret Archipelago’ (2015) at Palais de Tokyo. Upon entering the museum, my field of vision was captured by their 24-channel video installation titled ‘The Game’, which occupied much of the gallery space and equally monopolised the other viewers’ gaze. LE Brothers and I subsequently met in Saigon where we discussed their works and practice. Since then, I have had the pleasure of curating their works in several exhibitions, recently ‘The Game | Viet Nam by LE Brothers’ (2016–17) at the Jim Thompson Art Center in Bangkok.

Throughout our collaboration and in-depth conversations, from their dreams and beliefs, to their relation to the history of their country, my appreciation of LE Brothers has widened from the duo as artists making art to artists making art with the desire of effecting a more embracing world. LE Brothers often revisit the past in their works as sites of personal and communal histories, employing their look alike physical appearances as identical twins to create powerful performances, durational projects and video documentations that typically involve performative interactions with the local communities.

LE Brothers were born on April 3, 1975, in Quang Binh province in North Vietnam. In 1991, they moved to Hue, the ancient capital of Vietnam, where they currently live and work. They studied drawing and graphic design at the College of Arts, Hue University, with a foundation in traditional lacquer painting. They have never received formal education in new media and performance art, and yet their command of both is remarkable.