S L E E P
Moi Tran
S L E E P by Moi Tran
For this overnight S L E E P event we will be sleeping in the Artsadmin/Toynbee Studios buildings in London.
‘THE SLEEPING BODY IS AN ICONIC STATE OF EVERYDAY INTIMACY, VULNERABILITY AND NATURAL POWER’
S L E E P invites transient encounters in the forming of collective experience and thinking in a domain of intimacy.
S L E E P frames the resting and vulnerable body in public space as an event of withdrawal, resistance and refusal.
This is a recurring piece of participatory real time experience that invites group contemplation of sleep as a conscious reclamation of public space.
Each public enactment of S L E E P is presented within a theme of thought, that tends towards discourse on immediate events or a theme that is part of the Artist’s ongoing research.
This year marks 50 years since the end of the brutal war in Vietnam. As a Vietnamese person who is here because of what they did there*, in S L E E P, Moi Tran seeks ways to commemorate the loss and harm caused by war but also celebrate the resilience of the beautiful people of Vietnam who found strength and hope in adversity. This commemoration is also dedicated to all peoples around the world who are resisting oppressors and sacrificing everything they have for a life of peace.
For S L E E P Moi Tran will curate a series of creative sharings and extends an invitation to all sleepers be part of a ritual as part of this commemoration.
* Borrowed from “We are here because they were there” attributed to Stuart Hall, a prominent British-Jamaican cultural theorist and sociologist.
Moi Tran employs research, theatre, text, sound, installation, video, and performance making to examine theorisations on the politics of emotional reckoning and states of displaced feeling. Her work probes encounter of witnessing in events of fugitive performativity and the politics of sound as critical record. Her interests in alternative modes of communication have produced experiments for imagining and performing counternarratives inside and outside archives of information. She collaborates with sound makers, dancers, performers, scientists to reimagine conventional performance making.
Tran is currently commissioned by the Wellcome Collection, Performing Borders/Performance Possession Automaton. She will contribute to ‘By the Means at Hand’ a project by Vlatka Horvat for the Croatian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale – the 60th International Exhibition of Visual Art 2024 by invitation. She has presented and performed her work nationally and internationally ‘Well Settled’ (LUX U.K & OutPost VN); ‘SLEEP’(Live Art Development Agency/Royal Court /Pushkin House); ‘Civic Sound Archive’ Solo show PEER (UK); ‘Reshaping the collectible’ Tate Modern (UK); Sign Chorus (Da Nang, Vietnam); ‘Sonic Signalling in Reverse’ (Gothenburg Biennale)’; ‘The Bolero Effect’ (VCCA Vietnam); ‘The Circuit’ (Prague Quadrennial Festival); ‘I love a broad margin to my life’ Solo show (Yeo Workshop, Singapore); Shy God Chapter Mot (Chisenhale)‘Shy God – A Chorus’ (SPILL Festival UK); Landing 1.2.3 (Mark Rothko Centre Latvia)
Tran also works as a visual collaborator in set and costume design for Theatre, Dance and Opera. She is currently working on productions at Donmar Warehouse, Almeida Theatre and Lionsgate Productions.
Art: www.moitran.com
Design for performance: www.moitran.co.uk
- There are wheelchair accessible toilets at Toynbee Studios. Read more about Accessibility at Toynbee Studios.
- All toilets at Toynbee Studios are gender neutral.
- A relaxed performance kit with yoga mats, blankets, cushions and ear defenders is available.
- BSL interpretation is available on request. Email access@artsadmin.co.uk or call 020 7247 5102 to arrange this, and please give at least two week’s notice.
- Please let us know if anyone else such as an access assistant needs to attend with you. Email access@artsadmin.co.uk or call 020 7247 5102 to arrange this, and please give at least two week’s notice.
- Please let us know if you have any additional access requirements, but please bear in mind that the sleeping arrangements will be very basic. Sleepers need to be able to be able to safely sleep in such makeshift conditions.
Image credit: Moi Tran, S L E E P 2025, Photo by Moi Tran