TRONG G. NGUYEN projects.......bio


Marcel Duchamp Versus Bobby Fischer
2008, performance and video projection on a trapezoidal pedestal

   

"Anyway, it’s always other people who die." (Epitaph on Marcel Duchamp's grave)

Two individuals play a friendly game of chess - best two out of three - while channeling the spirits of masters Marcel Duchamp and Bobby Fischer. The first two matches took place in New York City and the third at Dwarf Gallery/Sequences Real Time Festival in Reykjavik, Iceland, site of Fischer's 1973 World Chess Championship victory.

In 1958 Bobby Fischer became the youngest Grandmaster ever at the age of 15. Duchamp, who himself achieved Master level as a French national player, was made a Grandmaster of the Priory of Scion by Nguyen in his "lost chapter" to the Da Vinci Code. As Duchamp turned his back on art, so too did Fischer with competitive chess. Or so they claimed.

In MDVBF, the arguably greatest chess player ever faces the arguably greatest artist ever.

RESULTS
Match 1: Duchamp (Nguyen) draws Fischer (Matt Lucas)
Match 2: Duchamp (Nguyen) defeats Fischer (Eduardo Alexander Rabel)
Match 3: Duchamp (Nguyen) defeats Fischer (Tómas Lemarquis)


Left Image: Trong G. Nguyen and Tómas Lemarquis. Dwarf Gallery, October 14, 2008.