Archiving in Community: Workshops in Collaboration with An Việt Archives

As the first public programmes of 2026, we collaborate with An Việt Archives (AVA), the largest known British-Vietnamese archive, to present two archiving workshops that explore memory, sound, and community through imaginative and personal approaches. Taking place in an intimate setting, these workshops foreground reflection, hands-on engagement, and collective sharing.

Both events are conceived as open-ended and community-driven, with no prescribed outcomes. Participants will hear directly from members of An Việt Archives about their practice of community archiving, learn about the everyday lives of Vietnamese and Southeast Asian refugees in Britain, particularly through our shared experience of neighbouring in Hackney, East London. These histories form a starting point for dialogue across time, place, and communities across boundaries.

Across the two workshops, the archive is approached not as a static repository, but as a living practice shaped by care, listening, and imagination. From working with archival materials and personal memories to listening deeply to family sound archives, participants are invited to consider how archives are made, held, and activated in relation to diasporic experience.

Free entry, spaces limited, sign-up essential.

Workshop I: How do we remember? An Archive Lab

Thursday, 22 January 2026, 6–8pm

This lab will take participants on a deep dive into the practice of community archiving, using a curated selection of materials from AVA’s collection that speak to the journeys, resilience, and everyday life of Vietnamese and Southeast Asian refugees in Britain.

Together, participants will explore what makes something an archive - beyond boxes, documents, and photographs - and consider how personal and community-held memories become forms of meaning-making. Rather than seeing the archive as a static collection, AVA approach it as a living, communal practice. Archiving becomes a way to gather, to honour those who came before us, and to imagine the ancestors we hope to become. This workshop invites participants into that ongoing process of questioning, tending, and storytelling.

The workshop is facilitated by Phương Anh Nguyễn, Kaitlan Bui, and Trà My Hickin of An Việt Archives.

Workshop II: Sound, Memory, and Diaspora: An Archiving Workshop with Thierry Phung

Saturday, 24 January 2026, 2-4pm

Producer and music programmer ONY (Thierry Phung) invites audience into his genre-bending sound world to explore the power of audio manipulation and archives in this special workshop held in collaboration with An Việt Archives. Drawing on his EP, Children of the Apocalypse - a reflection on family migration and the legacy of Agent Orange - Phung demonstrates how he turns raw samples (including documentary excerpts and video game sounds) into ‘dark, ethereal, and uncanny’ musical environments.

The workshop emphasizes the vital first step of deep listening to your family archive (voices, karaoke, surrounding sounds, music libraries) to find the sonic and narrative inspiration for your work. Learn techniques to record, distort, and layer these personal audio clips, transforming them into rich, textural soundscapes that archive and reimagine your own cultural heritage.

Participants are asked to bring their own laptop if they wish to take part in the hands-on audio manipulation during the session.

The workshop is facilitated by Thierry Phung, Cường Minh Bá Phạm, and Trà My Hickin of An Việt Archives.

Access Information

Both events take place on the ground floor with step-free access in our multi-purpose programme space, with a fully accessible, all-gender bathroom.

Please feel free to inquire with info@asymmetryart.org if you would like to discuss any access needs. Please kindly be advised that requests should be made one week in advance of the event, and we will try our best to make accommodations subject to availability.

About An Việt Archives

An Việt Archives is the largest known British-Vietnamese archive. It is an ongoing exploration of archives, alternatives, memory work, and community history. AVA believes that an archive is not just a collection of documents, photos, or materials; rather, these mediums are forms of meaning, memory, and knowledge-making. Led by a team of volunteers, AVA cares for the surviving materials of the An Việt Foundation (AVF), a community organisation founded in East London in the 1980s to support thousands of Vietnamese and Southeast Asian refugees. AVF provided essential services - home-cooked meals, help with housing, English classes, health outreach, mother-tongue teaching – and, just as importantly, created a space for displaced people to gather, connect, and ease the isolation of resettlement.

Image: AVA workshops at ESEA Community Centre. Photo by Joyce Mak. Courtesy of An Việt Archives