06/08/2026
ON VIEW // Dacchi Dang: ‘8 x 8 series’ (2014)
In ‘Archetypes: 30 Years of 4A’, pause and spend time with Dr Dacchi Dang‘s ‘8 x 8 series’ (2014).
Back in 1997, Dacchi exhibited seven black and white prints at 4A, each of which measured 5 x 5cm. The photographs depicted scenes from Dacchi’s first visit to Vietnam in 1994 after emigrating to Australia in 1982. The photographs were purposely presented in such a small format to encourage viewers to look closely and spend time with the images.
In ‘Archetypes’, Dacchi presents a handful of those original Vietnam photographs alongside photos taken in Paris, France in 2003 during a Cité internationale des arts Residency. While scaled up now to 8 x 8cm, the photographs nonetheless require the viewer’s close attention as the Paris and Vietnam images are mixed up in no particular order, signifying the bleed between cultures — homeland versus hostland, coloniser versus colonised.
While in Paris, Dacchi recognised many things that reminded him of Vietnam from mopeds to pot-au-feu, which was adapted by the Vietnamese as phở. Of course, these comforts were the direct result of the violent colonisation inflicted upon the Vietnamese by the French. But Dacchi’s sense of being at home in the “colonial homeland,” so to speak, represents an uncomfortable albeit understandable sense of oneness.
Exhibition
🗓 11 July – 20 September 2026
🕐 Wed–Sun, 11am–5pm
🎟 Free entry
📍 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Haymarket
📷1: Portrait of Dacchi Dang at Archetypes: 30 Years of 4A (opening event), 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, 2026. Photo by Diana Nguyen.
📷2 - 6: Archetypes: 30 Years of 4A (installation view), 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, 2026. Photo by Kai Wasikowski.
