Vietnamese popular imagery
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Popular imagery consisting of cultural pictures and those
produced on the Tet (a traditional lunar year festival)
incarnates the popular intellect. Their origin may be dated
back from times immemorial. Folk-paintings are preserved and
continue their evolution through successive historical
periods of the country.
Cultural pictures emerge in Vietnam along with the cult of
ancestors and the worship of divinities personifying natural
phenomene. Tet and cultural pictures have become a demand of
the cultural life, a source for popular art, and a
constituent element of contemporary folk culture.
The need for numerous Tet and cultural pictures has long
enabled the appearance in Vietnam of wood engraving. Some
families of wood engravers were reported as far back as the
Ly period (XI- XII centuries), and the subsequent Tran
period already managed to put paper currency into
circulation. Wood engraving was improved in the early Le
period thanks to the adoption of Chinese techniques. From
that time onwards, folk art began to be diversified.
The Mac period (XVI century) saw a considerable development
of popular imagery. The presence of folk-paintings in the
houses of high ranking officials in Thang Long royal city
has been confirmed by a poem of Hoang So Khai, a then man of
letters:
"Chung Quy depicts expertly
The red talismans exorcizing evil spirits and
preventing inauspicious elements
The picture of a Rooster I hang on the door will
certainly scare away ghosts and devils.
Below the verandah the flowers are blossoming out".
The Museum of History (Hanoi) still preserves a number of
woodcuts dating from the 4th year of Minh Mang reign (1823).
According to some family registers of wood cutters,
Vietnamese folk paintings were favoured by a stability and
development from XVIII - XIX centuries to the August
revolution.
Folk paintings are produced throughout the country. Based on
artistic styles, printing techniques, and materials used, we
may classify popular pictures into some artistic currents
bearing the names of localities producing them.
Most prevalent are those produced in Dong Ho, a village in
Northern Vietnamese delta, that are much appreciated by
peasants. The poonah paper is covered by the popular artist
with a substance extracted from oyster shell which reveals
supple parallel lines. The background paper also radiates a
silvery light, and sometimes shows a red hue given by a
liquid extracted from the sophora japonica flower or an
orange tint brought about by sappan-wood, which leads to an
elegant composition of colours. For some pictures, black
strokes and a certain colour are enough to give the
expression. Most colours used for the pictures derive from
natural materials. For example, the white is taken from
oyster shell, the black from charred bamboo leaves, the red
from sappanwood, the blue from indigo leaves, the yellow
from sophora japonica flowers. The mixture or the
superimposition of colours can give rise to a number of
hues. These natural colours, placed next to one another,
highlight one another and look animated like in a dance.
Dong Ho pictures are aimed at offering good wishes and
describing the daily life and social ralations in the
countryside. On the Tet occasion, every house is decorated
with a few Dong Ho pictures. The poor dwelling-house, which
used to be the place of family reunion, seems to be plunged
into the radiance of these popular pictures that contribute
somewhat to the merry laughter of family members.
Folk-paintings from other currents show black strokes, and
colours are applied within the outline. An example of this
painting genre is the Hang Trong pictures which are sold
especially to city dwellers. Hang Trong pictures are
sometimes drawn totally by hand; not printed with a woodcut.
Colouring is made after the drawing has been completed,
which enables a lot of subtle nuances.
Hang Trong pictures are made with pigments and paper of
large format imported from abroad. Their themes sometimes
coincide with those dealt with by Dong Ho pictures, but most
prevalent are cultural pictures. They are generally
displayed in large sitting rooms or in sanctuaries plunged
in incense smoke.
Apart from these two currents, Kim Hoang pictures are
created in city outskirts. They are drawn or printed on red
or yellow paper imported from China, and so they are usually
called red pictures. On Kim Hoang pictures are printed black
strokes and masses while figurs of other colours are drawn
by hand. The picture is sometimes reprinted to bring out the
strokes. For Kim Hoang pictures, the indigo blue is prepared
by the artist himself while other colours are made from
pigments bought in market places. Though colours are applied
on pictures in a simple manner, figurs look no less vivid.
Besides the themes that are similar to Dong Ho ones, we may
see on Kim Hoang pictures big characters whose strokes are
embellished with floral disigns symbolic of the four seasons
of the year.
Sinh pictures made in Hue city outskirts are all cultural
ones suitable to primitive belief, that reflects an ancient
Viet thingking before a mysterious and sacred nature being
incarnated by divinities prayed by humans for security and
happiness. Particularly in vogue is the "Goddess image" that
governs the lot of each woman. Stroles on Sinh pictures are
printed in black colour with a woodcut. A few strokes in
other colours may be added to the picture, but the
background sometimes remains uncoloured. Only pictures made
with modern printing press are polychromatic.
Each artistic current follows a characteristic style, yet on
every picture are seen outlined masses of colours. With this
enjoyable composition, folk paintings discard the
perspective, and so they can be beheld from different
angles. Large figurs of divinities are placed above and in
the middle while humans are of smaller dimensions. Figurs of
animals and floral paterns are either large or little
according to the impression to be created.
Popular imagery in Vietnam develops the best elements
inherited from preceding periods and, at the same time,
adopts from other artistic genres what is suitable to it
whereby to enrich its own identity.
Vietnamese popular imagery has a long process of evolution,
yet the collection of images and the research into them had
not been conducted until half a century ago. A rich
collection made by Maurice Durand, prior to the August
revolution of 1945, in association with Paul Levy, Tran Van
Giap and Tran Huy Ba was exhibited in Paris in 1960.
Following this, there appear in Hanoi a number of images
sold to foreign tourists. The research into popular imagery
has been carried out more exhaustively. From Nguyen Do Cung
to us, the ranks of researchers have been swollen, many
questions are already answered, but yet a lot of things are
still to be discovered.
This collection will hopefully help the readers understand
the mentality and the aesthetic taste of our forefathers.
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