A voice silenced, yet not

Young Chang

Theresa Hak Young Cha’s retrospective exhibit hangs heavy with a

feeling of oppression.

There’s an eeriness between the walls -- a sense that questions were

left only half-explored, a feeling of regret and wistfulness for an

immigrant who learned English as a second language, felt displaced most

of her life and then was murdered at the age of 31 by a security guard in

her building.

The collection at UC Irvine’s Beall Center for Art and Technology

focuses on issues like language, identity, displacement, movement and the

pressures of assimilation. Through use of video, live performances that

were documented and even a poem, Cha expresses herself in sparse,

sometimes eerily reflective forms.

When asked if she was a sad person, classmate and friend Yong Soo Min

said,

“Much of her work is about the experience of an exile -- somebody who

is separated from one’s homeland. And I think a lot of Koreans, when they

think about their history, become very sad.�

Cha immigrated to the United States at age 11. The Korean artist had a

great aptitude for languages -- even picking up French and Latin along

the way, according to Min.

Her retrospective exhibit, at the Beall Center through March 10, gives

off an exiled feel. The pieces often focus on the repetition of words,

how they can be manipulated in meaning and form, how one word can mean

many things, how one word can physically become more words, how the sound

and segments of words actually contain abstract qualities.

In her own “Artist’s Statement,� written four years before her 1982

murder, Cha says she experienced a “different perception and orientation

toward language� because she learned English at a later age.

Even so, Cha wrote “Dictee,� a book that addressed language, images,

history and the image and role of women, which was published a year

before her death.

“Her best known work is probably her book,� said Ann Pellegrini,

associate professor of drama at UCI. “She never got to experience the

success of that book, but part of what that book was is wrestling with

the question of untimeliness.�

The pieces in “Dream� also speak about time and language.

One work shows a series of parts, each part featuring just a word. The

first says “markings.� The second says “bruise.� The third, “heartache.�

The fourth, “black and blue.� The fifth, “blacks and blues.� The sixth,

“mark.� The seventh, “blues.�

Each word gets its own canvas, each canvas its own frame.

Min interprets the piece like this: If you’re blue, you’re sad. She

also sees a connection to African-American history. And there’s a

discussion about the history of the blues as a musical genre.

“That’s probably one interpretation,� Min said.

Another work plays with the words “another� and “other,� as they’re

arranged vertically until “another� reads like “an other� in varying

patterns of repetition.

“In a lot of her pieces she’s interested in the viewer, the audience,

exploring a lot of these words either as fragments or repetition so we’re

aware of the abstract quality of words,� Min said.

Another piece plays with the word “Amer.� It’s stitched on one of the

stripes of the American flag and convey Amer’s many meanings:

“Amer� is half of “America.�

The word means “bitter� in French.

The pair of words “a� and “mer� means “to the sea� in French.

And again in French, the pair also means “to mother.�

“Maybe she’s suggesting she’s half here,� Min said. “Or making a

statement that the flag can represent many bitter histories and

experiences . . . or the sea as a place that separates her from her

country of origin or a sea that was the means by which she crossed.�

One of Cha’s performance pieces is titled “Aveugle Voix,� which

literally means “blind� and “voice� in French.

The performance, documented in frames and hung at the Beall Center,

shows Cha blindfolded with a strip of cloth that reads “voix� and

strapped across the mouth with cloth that reads “aveugle.�

Her routine involved movement and manipulation of the cloth.

“She was wrestling with issues before there was even an arts community

talking about them,� Pellegrini said. “Her death is arresting for the

viewer, for the critic, because we’re stopped in our tracks and we’ll

never know what she would’ve done.�

FYI

* WHAT: “The Dream of the Audience�

* WHEN: Through March 10. Beall Center hours are noon to 5 p.m.

Tuesday through Sunday and noon to 8 p.m. Thursday.

* WHERE: UC Irvine’s Beall Center for Art and Technology, at the

campus, corner of University and Campus drives

* COST: Free

* CALL: (949) 824-2787