Ho Tzu Nyen
Three Stories: Monsters, Opium, Time
Kiang Malingue
Hong Kong

For Ho Tzu Nyen, histories are neither linear nor contained. They are spectral, fragmented, and often resistant to the kind of authoritative narratives that empires, colonizers, or even anthropologists have sought to impose. His 2015 video The Nameless conjures a ghostly version of the real-life Lai Teck, an enigmatic triple agent who moved between colonial powers, Communist insurgents, and revolutionary forces during the 1930s and ’40s in Southeast Asia. Known by more than 50 pseudonyms, this “nameless” figure slipped between identities and across boundaries, leaving elusive traces of his existence across official archives. Lai Teck is not just an individual for Ho, but an allegory for Southeast Asia itself—a region as manifold as the character he portrays.