“Scratching at the Moon” at Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Curators: Anna Sew Hoy and Anne Ellegood
February 10–July 28, 2024
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Three years ago, artist Anna Sew Hoy approached ICA LA director Anne Ellegood about organizing a show of Asian American artists. The idea came about in response to an uptick in violence against Asian Americans, a pandemic that seemed endless, and an air of generalized uncertainty. But all of that hung at the background of the show that resulted, which instead focused on mapping networks of Asian American artists with ties to LA.
Until “Scratching at the Moon” went on view, no other LA museum had ever claimed to mount a show with such a stated focus. That alone would make this exhibition significant enough. But what Sew Hoy and Ellegood produced was more than merely a first, as the show questioned what it meant to obtain visibility altogether. Many of the artists in this show, like the late Yong Soon Min, who died during the exhibition’s run, had been cultivating generations of Asian American artists, even when mainstream institutions did not take note.
Sew Hoy and Ellegood drew their inspiration from the show for Julietta Singh, who has theorized that the body functions as something akin to a limitless archive that exceeds a linear version of history. Accordingly, this was not a straightforward survey, although it did include artists dealing with the past, such as Amanda Ross-Ho and Na Mira, whose works drew their inspiration from their artistic forebears—the former from her parents, the latter from Theresa Hak Kyung Cha.
A sense of loss haunted the show, though this was not an exhibition about death either. Dean Sameshima exhibited pictures shot at massage parlors and gay bars and clubs, though his photographs only bear witness to the material traces of the people who visited them, not the customers themselves. Patty Chang, meanwhile, showed a video in which scientists investigate a porpoise’s cause of death. But instead of feeling dour, the show functioned as a celebration of life and togetherness. As Sew Hoy and Ellegood wrote in the catalog, “We have survived and thrived up to this point in time and we are able and equipped to continue to bear witness together through our words, thoughts, and actions.”
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