ai. company logo
ai.
Skip to main content
  • Menu
  • Artists
  • Exhibitions & Art Fairs
  • News
  • Shop
  • Contact
Cart
0 items £
Checkout

Item added to cart

View cart & checkout
Continue shopping
Menu

Artworks

Sung Tieu, No Gods No Masters, 2017
https://vimeo.com/233216087/c6838240d6

Sung Tieu

No Gods No Masters, 2017
HD video
19min 13 secs
Copyright The Artist
Enquire
%3Cdiv%20class%3D%22artist%22%3ESung%20Tieu%3C/div%3E%3Cdiv%20class%3D%22title_and_year%22%3E%3Cspan%20class%3D%22title_and_year_title%22%3ENo%20Gods%20No%20Masters%3C/span%3E%2C%20%3Cspan%20class%3D%22title_and_year_year%22%3E2017%3C/span%3E%3C/div%3E%3Cdiv%20class%3D%22medium%22%3EHD%20video%3C/div%3E%3Cdiv%20class%3D%22dimensions%22%3E19min%2013%20secs%3C/div%3E

Further images

  • (View a larger image of thumbnail 1 ) Thumbnail of additional image
  • No Gods No Masters
The film begins with a slide of negative images set in Mo Cay, a rural district in the southern part of Vietnam. Layered with footage of the landscape is the...
Read more
The film begins with a slide of negative images set in Mo Cay, a rural district in the southern part of Vietnam.

Layered with footage of the landscape is the sound of the jungle and the echoes of Vietnamese funeral music. As the film goes on, one can hear the shrieks of a baby, and later, the cries and moans of a man, both sounds taken from the so called “Ghost Tape No. 10”, a haunting sound tape developed by PSYOP in 1969 as a psychological weapon. The film transits to images of a group of people sitting in a circle as they perform a private ritual in a private home.

The film then slips into colour, prayers of a woman can be heard as the footage switches back and forth between jungle and domestic scenes. The video was filmed in Mỏ Cày and on Núi Bà Đen (Black Virgin Mountain) where the ghost tape was broadcast during the Vietnamese-American war and Tieu’s own family home in Hai Duong.

By contrasting the deployment of spiritual ghosts as psychological warfare with domestic scenes of a family prayer, the work investigates the layered history of spiritual traditions and psychological manipulations and their usage as a means to convey contemporary desires today.
Close full details
Share
  • Facebook
  • X
  • Pinterest
  • Tumblr
  • Email
Previous
|
Next
115 
of  155
Manage cookies
Copyright © 2025, ai. gallery
Site by Artlogic
Send an email
Instagram, opens in a new tab.

This website uses cookies
This site uses cookies to help make it more useful to you. Please contact us to find out more about our Cookie Policy.

Manage cookies
Accept

Cookie preferences

Check the boxes for the cookie categories you allow our site to use

Cookie options
Required for the website to function and cannot be disabled.
Improve your experience on the website by storing choices you make about how it should function.
Allow us to collect anonymous usage data in order to improve the experience on our website.
Allow us to identify our visitors so that we can offer personalised, targeted marketing.
Save preferences
Close

Join our mailing list

Signup

* denotes required fields

We will process the personal data you have supplied in accordance with our privacy policy (available on request). You can unsubscribe or change your preferences at any time by clicking the link in our emails.