Tommy Kha has already had a very long, weird day by the time he picks up the phone at a quarter to 10 on Tuesday night. Less than 24 hours earlier, local news outlets in Memphis had begun reporting that one of Kha’s pieces—depicting the Memphis-reared, Brooklyn-based photographer in an Elvis Presley–inspired jumpsuit—had been removed from display at the Memphis International Airport less than two months after its installation.
Constellations VIII, which Kha made in 2017, appeared among other pieces in a newly renovated concourse at the airport early this year. The Memphis UrbanArt Commission had facilitated the installation, but, according to local reports and the Memphis-Shelby County Airport Authority (MSCAA), Elvis Presley fans were unhappy with what they perceived to be a “disrespectful” representation of the Memphis icon. But the assumption belies Kha’s long and loving personal history with the city of Memphis, and omits the fact that Presley has figured in his work for years.
Kha approaches his work as a way to understand the past, his subjects often warmly lit in sunlight. He takes an atypical spin on self-portraiture, presenting himself as a semi-completed jigsaw puzzle or a stack of photocopies. The star of Constellations VIII, for example, is a cardboard cutout of Kha. Presley is also a consistent focus, examined through Kha’s photographs around Memphis and portraits of tribute artists—not impersonators, as he clarifies.
Despite the dust-up around Constellations VIII, Kha remains gracious and level-headed about its scale. “As much as I appreciate and love the response to this whole thing, I hate that it is taking away from the conversations going on,” he said. “Ukraine, anti-trans bills, anti-abortion bills, and anti-Asian hate crimes are still going on. I live in New York City, and a lot of this stuff is hitting really close.”
About an hour before we spoke, the MSCAA announced that Kha’s piece would be returned to the concourse. “The Airport Authority appreciates the support that the community has shown for Tommy and we have made the decision to reinstall the artwork. We apologize to Tommy for the effect that this ordeal has had on him,” wrote Scott Brockman, CEO and president of the MSCAA, in a statement.
From there, Kha shared his thoughts with Pitchfork about the sudden whirlwind, his sense of community, and how Memphis has shaped his art.
Pitchfork: So, what happened? When were you made aware that your work had been removed?
Tommy Kha: I was made aware that there was something going on. I got an email on March 8, and I had a phone meeting with the UrbanArt Commission on Thursday, March 10. That’s when I was told they would give me a heads up that they were going to move forward to remove the work. At that time, I was made more aware that what was happening that Tuesday kind of grew to something larger. I didn’t really think much of it, because people are free to speak what they want, as long as it doesn’t harm me. But I was reassured that they would let me know before they made any decision, and that if I was open, to talk further with a representative from the airport, at a time when I could choose, which was Wednesday the 16th.
Someone took a video and sent a screengrab sometime that weekend that they didn’t see it. I didn’t really know if they knew what the piece looked like—my face was on it, but I wasn’t really sure. Another friend of mine went down Tuesday evening, before the Zoom meeting on Wednesday, and confirmed that it was taken down. I was not told. The UrbanArt Commission, as far as I know, was not told. So, it was removed over a week ago, without me being told beforehand. When I asked about it in the meeting, they confirmed it right away, and I just stopped with any negotiations.
That’s such a short timeline—the piece had only been up since mid-February, right?
I think it went up at the end of January of this year, and there was more of an official announcement by mid-February. It wasn’t that long.
With some of the local reporting I saw, it sounded as though some of the negative feedback was racially motivated, but there weren’t too many details about that. Were you told about what the specifics were, or were you just given a broad-strokes explanation?
I honestly have no idea. I actually am still going on the record that I’m confused by the messaging. This art collection was supposed to show the vast variety of different voices from the visual arts community. We do not have a lot of spaces to begin with, at all.
People are free to speak their minds—I’m open to whatever people want to say. They can disagree with my art, as long as it doesn’t harm me. Don’t stab me or something.
I’m confused by the whole thing and the airport’s lack of transparency. I know that they have been trying, and I think everyone’s been trying. I think we can all do better, and that we should have a conversation about this and how this can better benefit people in some ways.
I’d love to hear a bit more about your own relationship with Elvis Presley and Elvis impersonators, what it was like for you growing up so close to all of that.
Well, first, they are called Elvis tribute artists. I do respect and love that community. They’re not impersonators. It might not be for other people, but I think what Elvis tribute artists do is art. Performance is such a one of my practices in my photography and the way I make pictures. But I grew up in Whitehaven, where Graceland is located. I was born and raised in Memphis. I even walked the neighborhood, and I would find myself outside the gates of Graceland. I wanted to get to know Memphis more through Elvis, but I also do that through the Memphis Chinese community.
There’s sometimes an outside perception that issues of race in the South are on a Black-and-white binary, but there are a lot of Southern communities of color that get forgotten about in those assumptions. How does that fit into your work and what happened with this piece?
I think people tend to also forget that I’m a child of immigrants—my parents fled the aftermath of the Vietnam War. These communities have always been here, and it’s now that we’re given the opportunity for space—which is ironic, because we’ve always been here. I think a lot of people are beginning to be a lot more open to possibilities, to new narratives, to familiar narratives, and revisiting something that may not be shared, and that’s OK. I think there have been more nuanced ways of talking about that in the South.
I went to Graceland Elementary, which was mostly an all-Black school. I was a child; I had no concepts of racism then. I always felt like I belonged from that experience. Progressing into public school, there’s definitely some things that become coded in a way that made people feel like they don’t belong. It’s weird that it’s that kind of erasure, that code that “you don’t belong here.”
An Instagram post I saw, it positioned Elvis to be the sole identity of Memphis, like Elvis was responsible for putting Memphis on the map. That sentiment is so disparaging. It’s erasure. It makes me fucking livid to erase the contribution of Black voices, and even if it wasn’t talking about race, it there’s so many great people that have come out of Memphis alone. What about everyday people there that actually make the city run? For my work to be removed, it echoed that sentiment. And, well, here we are.
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