Artist Do Minh Tam at the exhibition Singing on the Hill - Photo: T.DIEU
Every time Do Minh Tam opens a solo exhibition, it is an anticipated occasion for those who love his paintings.
This time, the exhibition "Singing on the Hill" by Do Minh Tam, taking place at the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum (lasting until December 11), also brings to art lovers many vibrations and joys spread from the artist's youthful, more cheerful soul.
The exhibition is a series of paintings by Do Minh Tam drawn in the past 5 years, after retiring from the Vietnam University of Fine Arts, yet it is like a hymn of colors and emotions.
Like the fool whistling and singing on the hill in the song The Fool on the hill by The Beatles that Do Minh Tam often listened to while painting, and like "How many village girls sing on the hill" in the poem Ripe Spring by Han Mac Tu.
The work Remembering the countryside by Do Minh Tam
The Road to Abstract Painting
Do Minh Tam is from Hung Yen but grew up in the heart of the 36 streets of Hanoi . He studied drawing continuously from the age of 7-8, through intermediate level, to university, and then graduate school.
It can be said that he has a very systematic process of learning painting at school and self-studying throughout his life, along with teaching painting for 30 years.
Do Minh Tam said that during his secondary school years, he practiced his realistic drawing skills very well. But then, during his trips to the South, starting in 1978, he bought books on Western art while wandering on Calmette Street in Ho Chi Minh City, which made him curious and then very interested in surrealist art.
Books like Encyclopedia of Art , books on impressionist art, modernism... led him into the fascinating path of surrealist painting.
Those were the years when the country had just begun to reform and faced many difficulties. In such circumstances, people often indulged in dreams. Surrealist paintings were the dreams that Do Minh Tam entered.
His surrealist paintings were partly influenced by the ancient folk festivals that had been deeply imprinted in his mind since childhood, when he followed adults to see bronze statues that at that time had to be secretly organized in the suburbs of Hanoi.
After several years of adventuring with surrealist painting, Do Minh Tam switched to abstract painting in his final years of university (1986), and has remained faithful to it to this day. By 1996, he considered himself to have formed his personal abstract art style.
Since his first solo exhibition in 1993 at 29 Hang Bai, Hanoi - the exhibition Alone, up to now Do Minh Tam has had nearly ten solo exhibitions and countless group exhibitions at home and abroad, recognized as one of the few leading abstract painters in Vietnam today.
Art critic Nguyen Quan commented that if abstract painting has a history of 2/3 of a century in Vietnam, then in the recent 20 years of explosion, Do Minh Tam's works are a significant contribution. Mr. Quan highly appreciated Do Minh Tam for his steadfast aesthetic vision, and his career full of professional awareness and honor.
Following artist Do Minh Tam for a long time, art researcher Vu Huy Thong (Vietnam University of Fine Arts) affirmed that Do Minh Tam is one of the few artists who have pursued abstract painting for a long time, creating a unique style, excelling in compositional ability and the ability to express a rich variety of extremely delicate color harmonies.
Works: Choir (left) and Going to Mass on the Full Moon Day (right)
A kind and delicate heart
One thing in Do Minh Tam's paintings that critic Nguyen Quan loves is the artist's kind and delicate soul clearly shown in his paintings.
The dry sunlight on the house wall, behind the canopy of leaves in an old backyard somewhere in the capital, or the gentle and quiet countryside... in Do Minh Tam's paintings make people linger.
The sophistication and kindness of Do Minh Tam is due to the years of childhood, youth and until now, always returning to nature, to the countryside. Do Minh Tam's life, interspersed with daily urban life, is full of trips back to the countryside, to nature during the evacuation period, or the years of taking students to practice in many mountainous and coastal provinces.
Therefore, although later on, abstract painting in Vietnam went from blooming fresh like a wave of innovation to gradually becoming chaotic commerce, Do Minh Tam still seemed to avoid that flow, according to the observation of critic Nguyen Quan.
"His humanistic aesthetic is gentle and kind. Perhaps he naturally follows the principle of the Russian abstract master: Art is to help refine the human soul. His abstract paintings contain a little flavor that is easily forgotten in the inherent blandness of life, making our artist a unique abstract artist in Vietnam," Nguyen Quan shared.
Do Minh Tam said that all of those subtleties and tolerances are due to his innocence. "I was born to love people, love nature, love my job, love food and drink. Innocence and honesty must be the initial capital of an artist. An artist must be innocent to be creative," Do Minh Tam said.
Painter Do Minh Tam was selected as a member of the Asia- Pacific delegation in the International Forum of the Asia-Pacific Contemporary Art Triennial (APT 2nd 1996, Brisbane, Australia).
He has been awarded the ASEAN Fine Arts Award, a bronze medal at the National Fine Arts Exhibition, has resided and exhibited his works in many countries in the region, his works are kept at the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum, the National Museum of Singapore, and in private collections in the country, Germany, the US, France, Australia, Hong Kong, Taiwan...
Source: https://tuoitre.vn/do-minh-tam-ngoi-hat-tren-doi-20251207100037806.htm
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