Kenneth Tam: Standing in Soft Formation Opening Reception

Join us for a public conversation with exhibiting artist Kenneth Tam and Daisy Nam, director of Ballroom Marfa, followed by an opening reception for Tam’s one-person exhibition, Kenneth Tam: Standing in Soft Formation. Featuring Tam’s most recent choreographed videos and sculpture in conversation together for the first time, Standing in Soft Formation explores the historical and present-day tropes of Anglo-American masculinity and their impact on Asian American identities. 

Kenneth Tam works with video, sculpture, installation, movement, performance, and photography. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, he examines themes including the performance of masculinity, the transformative potential of ritual, and expressions of intimacy within groups. Tam often implicates the male body in his projects, using humor and pathos to reveal the performative and unstable nature of identity, and often creates situations that foreground tenderness and vulnerability within unlikely settings. 

Daisy Nam is the executive director and curator at Ballroom Marfa, a contemporary art space located in Far West Texas dedicated to supporting artists through residencies, commissions, exhibitions, and performances. Previously from 2015–19, she was the assistant director at the Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, Harvard University. She co-edited a publication, Best! Letters from Asian Americans in the arts with Paper Monument in 2021.