Breath of Picture Village

Oh, girl with blue sash

Follow me to Mai village

Mai village having rich customs

With gentle river for bath and printing of paintings

Lying on the southern bank of the mild Duong River, the Dong Ho painting village nowadays no longer keeps dense and busy spectacles of in end-year monthly paintings markets. The village’s lanes are still full of red and yellow colors of paper, but the color is not originated from the red of young brick, the yellow of diep flower (butterfly), the black of coal of burned bamboo’s leaves, the glitter white of ground sea shell. The Dong Ho village now is colorful of the printing paper dyed with industrial pigment, of paper-made red, violet horses, multistoried houses, cars. The one-time painting village is now famous for making paper votive objects that are burned as religious offerings.

Nostalgia

According to Mai villagers, the folk name of the Dong Ho painting village in Thuan Thanh district of Bac Ninh Province (north of Hanoi), the painting career started from the century 16^th. In its golden age, the village had hundreds of painting models. The village was the most bustling from July and August (Lunar Calendar) till the end-year. At that time, all families of 17 clans in the village with thousands people from the elderly to the child, boys and girls attended to make paintings. Markets of Dong Ho paintings was always a festival particularly those in December (Lunar Calendar) held in Dec 6, 11, 16 and 26. Apart from buyers and sellers, the Dong Ho painting markets also attracted lots of painting lovers, poets and writers from Hanoi and neighboring areas for sightseeing and entertainment.

At the time when Dong Ho paintings were produced by collectives, the village was still prosperous. Tens of thousands of Dong Ho folk paintings were exported to Eastern European nations and African nations. The Dong Ho village became a symbol of Vietnamese folk paintings. Dong Ho paintings have been displayed in the Guinea national museum of arts and granted the most honorable award at the the IBA (International Book Artists) Exhibition in Germany’s Leipzig in 1971. Dong Ho painting makers were proud of their products having been brought outbound to introduce Vietnam’s cultural values to international friends.

The special character of Dong Ho paintings is not originated from artistic emotion, but from variety of colors, cubes and lines which are simple and plain but live and lovely. Paintings’ contents are familiar to the living standard of farmers in the Red River delta. Another special point is all materials to produce Dong Ho paintings are collected completely from nature, which makes this kind of painting have perfume of flower and grass. The background paper, made of bark of a tree called “Dzo, is originally white. People use natural materials to change the colors of the papers which are usually orange, pink, yellow, purple… villagers covered the painting by a layer of paste namely “diep” to protect the painting and their colors.

The “diep” paste is made of sea shells ground and mixed with sticky rice paste (called “ho nep”). Unlike the painting genres of Hang Trong, which was combined between printing on carved boards and adorning colors, Dong HO paintings are printed from carved boards. Each painting model includes at least four boards of colors and one carved board. Each Dong Ho painting often has 7-8 colors, printed in order from the red, green, white, pink or yellow to the black. Each carved board made of the wood of “thi” tree could be used for tens years. There are beautiful sets of carved boards having been handed over among generations such as a heirloom.

Origins

In the busy Dong Ho village nowadays, we can find places which still keep the breath of the one-time painting village. It is a Dong Ho painting cultural center of artist Nguyen Dang Che’s family, or a display room of more than 500 carved boards of Dong Ho paintings of artist Nguyen Huu Sam or sound of chisels in small class by young teacher, artist Nguyen Van Manh.

Many Vietnamese journalists, including people who have written many articles on the Dong Ho paintings and the making of painting, said no as being questioned about Nguyen Van Manh. However, the story of the young painting maker Nguyen Van Manh, whose alias is Toong, has been known by many American painters. Manh has spent many years on studying and maintaining the making of Dong Ho paintings.

Vietnamese-American female painter cum architect Tran Thi Hoa Lan and her husband, and writer Michel Clack are the first friends to introduce me to Nguyen Van Manh. It seemed that we were impressed with the young artist’ pure mind, all called him with the lovely alias Toong. Toong and his students are hard-working days by days in a small carving and printing factory, the only one left so far in the Dong Ho village will a wish to maintain and preserve this kind of folk painting line. Hundreds of carved boards of folk painting models have been restoring by Toong and his students.

If the printing phase seems to not selective about artists, the painting Dong Ho painting models and carving boards require painters and carvers for their love to the art and professional skills. With the nature of a artist and skill of a worker, Toong has created carving boards meeting strict requirements in quality by his teachers such as Nguyen Dang Che, Nguyen Huu Sam.

During a recent trip to the Dong Ho village, I visited Toong while he was busy of spreading “diep” paste and printing. Toong said more having a thorough grasp of quintessence in the making printing papers, more carving boards are beautiful amd familiar with the life. Artist Nguyen Dang Che is considered to deserve the credit for restoring partially the Dong Ho painting line. But it is not fair id we don’t remind contributions by the young artist Nguyen Van Manh.

For that very reason, after many years devoting quietly to the restoring of Dong Ho paintings, Toong and his students’ contributions have been recognized and encouraged by the Vietnam Ethnology Museum’s directorate. Carving boards of Dong Ho paintings, including many restored by Toong and his students have been introduced to the public at a recent exhibition.

Conclusion

The Dong Ho painting line has gradually been restored, but slowly. Apart from artists such as Sam, Che and Toong, almost Dong Ho villagers have trickled out of style; now they make paper votive objects. High profits from making paper votice objects have made the printing of paintings faded from villagers’ mind. To keep the enthusiasm to the printing of painting, Toong and his group of students fended for themselves by making paper votice object patterns to feed the printing of paintings. Sitting in his father’s display room of Dong Ho paintings, Nguyen Huu Qua (the first-born son of Artist Nguyen Huu Sam), who determined a university graduate of finance to follow his father to restore the folk painting line, sarcastically recited four lines of poetry:

“Oh, Girl in blue jean

Follow me to Mai village

Mai villagers change their livelihood nowadays

Taking paper ovtice objects as breadwinner instead!”

Posted by VBN on Feb 6 2010. Filed under Tourism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry