Research
I am a filmmaker and researcher based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, with a practice rooted in exploring urban spaces and the dynamic relationships between built and natural environments. My work delves into how communities and families are embedded within the urban fabric, and how the city’s spaces reflect the intricate balance of domesticity, work, and play. A key focus of my research is the city’s network of alleyways—locally known as hems—which represent the complexity of urban life and reveal much about the community's social dynamics.
In my current project, I extend these explorations to the Te Canal and its surrounding environments, investigating how man-made infrastructure interacts with natural ecosystems. Through my filmmaking practice, I aim to capture and reframe these intersections, presenting them as evolving entities that speak to the culture of the city.
My approach to filmmaking emphasizes abstraction and flow, focusing less on objects and more on the continuous relationships between spaces and events. Post-production techniques allow me to transform filmed experiences into layered visual narratives, highlighting color, pattern, and movement. By doing so, I aim to create works where the environment itself communicates its story, independent of human-centered narratives. I also integrate still photography, moving images, and augmented reality (AR) to create interconnected visual experiences that reconstitute familiar urban spaces in novel ways.
My broader thematic interests lie in understanding how the built environment reflects and generates the culture of place. I view the built environment as a living entity—an alternative voice that offers insight into the city’s complexities, distinct from human interpretations. My work offers new perspectives on how cities function and evolve, with a focus on making these hidden narratives visible.
My films have been exhibited at various international venues and festivals, and some of my works are included in moving image archives and databases. I am actively involved in the River Cities Network and the Planetary Civics Initiative, contributing to their projects that explore the intersections of urbanism, ecology, and cultural sustainability. Additionally, I am engaged in RMIT’s innovation initiatives and supervise HDR candidates in the fields of Architecture, Urbanism, and the Design School, where my practice-based research enriches my students' work.
PhD
Abstract
My creative practice examines processes of observation, filming and the re-presentation of a unique urban condition known as the hẻms, an area of compact mixed-use buildings, in District 4, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Using moving images of my observations, my practice employs a series of processes that illuminate the details of this part of HCMC.
My practice has developed a set of methods that build a relationship between the in-situ experience of the hẻms, a post production treatment with a series of customised lenses and filters, and edited sequences used for festivals and galleries. These are interspersed with two distinct periods of reflection that inform the subsequent treatments. With a focus on detailed documentation of event, movement and space the hẻms are recorded using extended sequences of footage that are illuminated through the lenses and filters. This allows the hẻms to be re-presented with different visual properties: zoom, blur, layering and extrusions to capture a rich collection of sequences that are contextually significant to HCMC.
The data gathered and manipulated through the documentation process speaks to the relationship between occupation and its fluidity highlighting a ‘tightness’ in the operation of the spaces. The documentation is a record of an urban condition that is increasingly under threat from demolition and redevelopment. This work offers a way of looking at these tight urban environments as rich spaces of community, culture and material vibrancy that can ultimately inform future urban planning and design thinking.presents examples of dense urban spatial capacity. The documentation is also a record of a unique urban condition, that is under threat from demolition and redevelopment. HCMC is rapidly expanding, and this research can inform future urban planning and design through the re-presentation of the hẻms, as a space capable tackling the associated issues.