HCM CITY — An exhibition featuring Japanese artist Meiro Koizumi's single-channel 17-minute video, Human Opera XXX 2005, has opened at San Art gallery in HCM City.

Emerging as one of the most distinguished artists of his generation, Koizumi imbues his personal thoughts and experiences of his own life into his practice, building and developing them into works with global stature.

The exhibition also includes another video work, My Voice Would Reach You (2009).

These works are emblematic of Koizumi's art, which reflects on the human spirit and its mental dilemma, as well as the complex contradictions of urban life.

In My Voice Would Reach You, the artist poignantly recalls the memory of his mother, desiring to speak with her, to bring her back from the dead and into the urban arena. Time collapses between past and present as we realise his futile determination to arrange an opportunity to see her again.

Human Opera XXX was undertaken during Koizumi's residency at the Rijksakadedemie in the Netherlands. In this work, he invites a member of the public to share a personal sad story.

What ensued was an uncomfortably humorous turn of events in which a local Dutch man's personal predicament was ridiculed into an unexpected performance with props and special effects.

Koizumi's art seeks to provoke the substance of humanity, while also highlighting the absurdity in how we commonly frame, control, record or recall social tragedy.

Born in Gunma in 1976, the artist lives and works in Yokohama, Japan. He studied in London at Chelsea Art and Design School and in Amsterdam at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten Institute.

His selected solo exhibitions include Broken Hero, Beautiful Afternoon Artspace, Sydney, Australia, 2011; Total Ecstasy, Annet Gelink Gallery, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, 2010; and MAM Project 009: Meiro Koizumi, Mori Art Museum in Tokyo, Japan, 2009.

He has also participated in numerous group exhibitions including Impersonate, Miro Foundation, Mallorca, Spain in 2011; Media City Seoul 2010, Seoul, South Korea; Liverpool Biennale 2010, FACT, Liverpool, UK, 2010; A Blow to Every Day, Osage Gallery, Hong Kong, China, 2009; and 3rd Nanjing Triennale, Nanjing Museum, Nanjing, China, 2008.

In September last year, San Art and Tokyo Wonder Site (TWS) in Japan entered into an art studio/residency exchange programme.

HCM City artist Tran Minh Duc undertook an artist-in-residency with TWS from September 14 to December 4. In February 2012, Koizumi visited HCM City for one month undertaking research towards his new work.

The artist's first exhibition in Viet Nam can be seen at San Art, 3 Me Linh Street, Binh Thanh District, until March 23. — VNS