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Finest Artists 2024-2025: Bùi Duy Thanh Mai

Posted on 10/04/2025

BÙI DUY THANH MAI

Year of birth: 1989

Field: Cultural practices based on social research

Bùi Duy Thanh Mai is an independent interdisciplinary researcher in social sciences and humanities. Mai graduated with degrees in Philosophy, Education and Asian studies in the US. She has multiple years of experience in consulting, designing and implementing solutions aimed at changing school curricula and social activity groups across the country. Mai was involved in the independent textbook project Cánh Buồm and is a member of the Philosophy with Children and Youth Network for Asia and the Pacific. In 2020, she initiated bóc-hành collective (unlayering-the-onion), a space in which members together explore underlying social issues and especially the gender aspects, with topics touching on responses to gender-based violence and concerns of modern-day office workers.

In 2024, after releasing the publication “Tan ca thôi, những niềm riêng tiếp nối” in February in the role of the editor-in-chief, Bùi Duy Thanh Mai focused on the theme of the kitchen. She wrote “Hiện tượng học ‘căn bếp'” (The ‘kitchen’ phenomenology) (Văn Nghệ Newspaper), “Bếp, chuyện nhỏ mà không nhỏ” (The kitchen: A small matter, yet not small) (Văn hóa quân sự Special), and coordinated the workshop series “Bếp ở đâu trong mỗi người?” (Where is the kitchen in each of us?) as part of the children’s book exhibition “Bế bế bồng bồng” at The Outpost Art Organisation. She was also a guest speaker in the talk event “Nấu nướng và Ngợi khen: Nhìn về giới từ căn bếp” (Cooking and Praise: A gender perspective focusing on the kitchen) (VGEM), and in the TV programme Cuộc sống thành thị (Urban life) (Hanoi Television) in the episode “Căn bếp đô thị: Nơi phản chiếu những thách thức của đời sống hiện đại” (Urban kitchen: A reflection of the challenges of modern life).

Bùi Duy Thanh Mai participated in three open studio events in “mấy mảnh vải mấy đường chỉ mấy nơi the queer w(e)aves” in collaboration with Queer Forever! and bà-bầu AIR. Mai was also a speaker at the academic seminar “Nữ tính vĩnh hằng và sự chất vấn từ cảm quan giới” (Eternal Femininity and the Questioning from Gender Perception) (Vietnam Institute of Literature). She was one of the 16 feminist creators selected to participate in the forum “Reclaiming narratives: feminist artivism in East, South, and Southeast Asia” in Taipei in June 2024. In early 2025, Mai displayed her work “We never hurt alone” at the duo exhibition “I Carry Your Love on My Back” in New Zealand.

Workshop “What do we tell each other beside meal-tables?”, 2024 Meeting Point on Art & Social Action in Asia. Photo: Hoàng Nguyễn

Art work “Untitled letter from dad”; Workshop: Cơ thể tôi là chất liệu. Photo: Bùi Duy Thanh Mai

Artwork “We never hurt alone”, dou exhibition “I carry your love on my back” at soft shell, experimental project under the Te Tuhi contemporary art space, Auckland, New Zealand
Photo: Bùi Duy Thanh Mai

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Deadline for voting: 14 Apr 2025

HANOI GRAPEVINE’s FINEST is an annual event that honors contemporary art projects in Vietnam. The event is organized and nominated by Hanoi Grapevine and the general audience.

Entering its 6th year, Hanoi Grapevine’s Finest aims to go beyond an annual honouring event to become a contemporary archive of Vietnam’s art and cultural landscape, as well as a foundational platform to promote interdisciplinary collaborations both domestically and internationally, towards an open, fair, and transparent ecosystem.

This year, Hanoi Grapevine’s Finest 2024-2025 is divided into two major categories: Honouring and Recognition. Nominations are selected based on sets of criteria that aim to highlight the developmental significance and scale of impact, including activity level, community impact, creativity, organisational capability and artistic quality.