Quyên N-L (Nguyễn-Lê) is a queer vietnamese filmmaker born to boat refugee parents where Chumash and Tongva lands meet in Los Ángeles, California. Quyên's film work–spanning between documentary and scripted genres–focuses on the ways histories are deeply felt in the quotidian everyday. Their films are regularly studied in university classrooms and have been screened in film festivals, art galleries, public libraries, and community spaces worldwide. 

Nước (Water/Homeland) (2016) and Hoài (Ongoing, Memory) (2018) delve into the intersections of queer vietnamese american political identity. The two films are experimental explorations of the fragmented multilingual act of generational storytelling–and the psychic toll of its absence. 

Quyên’s foray into documentary was at first more of a practical endeavor, but their artistic practice is now deeply rooted in the ethics and slow reveal techniques of the format: The Morning Passing on El Cajón Boulevard (2019) is a observational documentary about a funeral director mourning an unexpected loss. Weaving together documentary, performance, installation, sculptures, and home videos, In Living Memory (2022) is a eulogy to the their mother's nail salon that permanently closed during the COVID pandemic. In Living Memory is currently streaming as a daytime emmy nominated episode of PBS/WORLD Channel's limited series Asian American Stories of Resilience and Beyond. 

Co-directed and produced with Tad Nakamura, Nobuko Miyamoto: A Song in Movement (2024) uses archival material to create a vivid portrait of iconic Asian American movement activist Nobuko Miyamoto’s decades-long artistic career.

Quyên was also an Associate Producer for two Sundance award winning feature films - Julie Ha and Eugene Yi's Free Chol Soo Lee and Sing J. Lee's The Accidental Getaway Driver.

Their work has been supported by Kartemquin Films, Points North Institute, Center for Asian American Media, and the California Arts Council. They are an alumnus of the National Multicultural Alliance's Producer Lab, Visual Communications’ AWC program, and InnerCity Filmmakers. Quyên holds an M.A. in Visual Studies and B.A. in Comparative Literature / Philosophy, Politics, & Law.

ELSEWHERE

PRESS
Los Angeles Times
San Diego Union Tribune
Diacritics
Teen Vogue
​Buzzfeed
Sahtu Press
Long Beach Post
Visual Communications
The Advocate
Vietcetera
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​RADIO/ PODCASTS
Queering the Air, 3CR, Melbourne Australia
Asian Voices Radio Podcast
LGBT & Viet Identities In Cinema, My Vietnam Podcast

SCHOLARLY MENTIONS