KVT – Nguyen Quang Huy’s Exhibition at Art Vietnam

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Blue at Art Vietnam

I really should disqualify myself from commenting on Nguyen Quang Huy’s exhibition at Art Vietnam for the following reasons:

I‘ve been fully emamoured of Huy’s beautiful, blue female faces ever since I saw my first one at Salon Natasha so many years ago that it’s hard to remember when and a couple peering shyly at me through the strings of hanging red roses at the original Bobby Chin’s, the one near Hoan Kiem Lake, at a time in history when you could count the western and fusion restaurants in Hanoi on the fingers of a hand and a half. I loved them when they were surrounded with spirals of text and when the faces disappeared into soft blue mists. Now they’ve been re-invented without the spirals but as if glancing through very sheer veils that give them a romantic mystery that no-one else, not even a clever forger, is able to capture.

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I am in love with the mountains and rocky plateaus of Ha Giang province. After 15 trips exploring as much as I’m allowed to, I cannot but comment glowingly on the work of this artist who portrays the faces of its ethnic people so beautifully, without any of the commercialism, exploitation or sensationalism so often evident in the art work and photographs of his Kinh colleagues or that of rush-away foreigners. I think that I’ll eventually get to like Huy’s couple of rocky plateau, Meo Vac landscapes, but for the present I’m infatuated with the faces. I like the way that Huy adds a great dignity to these faces that, behind the masks we all put on for the photographer or painter, so often live lives of incredible toil and hardship. Lives in fiercely patriarchal societies where life expectancy is still in the early fifties, child mortality is high, educational opportunities can be negligible and health services often basic. If you know the Ha Giang of the Hmong and are able look behind the constructed quaintness that tourist agencies and their cronies necessarily paint for profit or theme park type exploitation, you’ll appreciate the rather sensitive video show that goes hand in hand with the females in the portraits. It’s really worth taking the opportunity to grab a comfy seat and take it all in.

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I’m a huge fan of the use of artificial light as – or in – good artwork and have been ever since I entered a space lit by Dan Flavin’s fluro tubes or viewed a neon concept of Mario Metz. As Huy is a very good, sensitive artist he uses light the same way. The soft blue in Huy’s light installation reflects the calm and resilience of his portraits’ subjects and perhaps the Buddha outlines ask us to reflect on the sufferings and hardships these people may have to endure, or perhaps just to meditate on Hmong beauty (something I find very easy to do, male and female). Initially I was perplexed by the use of the Buddha image and would rather have had an outline of the high mountains that define Meo Vac in its big valley bowl, particularly as I don’t know if the Buddha has an iconic place in mountain Hmong spiritual lives but I’m definitely not any type of authority on this and I’m sure that any reservations I hold could be blown to bits by the artist. Whatever the blue glow is superb.

It’s a lovely exhibition, delicately installed and a great and soothing pleasure to be in the midst of. A marvelous exhibition to engage with mot minh (by yourself). Highly recommended for those virginal to Nguyen Quang Huy’s considerable portraiture charm and doubly recommended for those who want to re-connect.