Street art performance: Need for innovation

For over 10 years, street art performances have been maintained by the Provincial Traditional Arts Theater and the Provincial Cultural and Cinema Center. After initial successes and impressions, this activity has become increasingly monotonous, requiring comprehensive innovation to adapt to the new situation.

increasingly worn

We still remember the image of the artists happy and excited when receiving the notice of the Provincial People's Committee on December 27, 2011 about organizing a street art program to serve tourism . Less than a year later, the Provincial Traditional Arts Theater had built programs with the most outstanding repertoire and excerpts from the plays of the folk theater Bai Choi and Tuong art. Bringing Tuong and Bai Choi to the street at that time made a strong impression on the audience, especially foreign tourists. Some time later, the Provincial Cultural - Cinema Center also carried out the activity of singing folk Bai Choi in the coastal park area south of 2-4 Square (Nha Trang City), performing street music at the stage opposite Tue Tinh Street and was positively received by the audience.

Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Quang Trung - Deputy Director of the Provincial Traditional Arts Theater said: "Initially, the theater only performed 2 street art nights per week on weekends, then increased to 4 nights/week as it is now. The performance stage also moved from the Provincial Conference Center (46 Tran Phu) on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street to Tran Phu Street and is now the stage in the Tram Huong Tower area. However, because the performances are mainly taken from existing plays, there is no budget to build a separate program, so after only a few months of performance, the audience will know all the programs by heart, so the attractiveness is also reduced". Mr. Nguyen Van Viet - Deputy Director of the Provincial Culture - Cinema Center shared that from 2012 to now, the training cost for a Bai Choi singing artist is only 290,000 VND/night, while singers and musicians performing street music have an average of 250,000 VND/night. To expand the scale and quality of singing and street music programs to suit the current situation, the level of compensation needs to be increased to motivate, encourage and retain artisans and artists participating in the activities.

According to Mr. Le Van Hoa - Deputy Director of the Department of Culture and Sports , street art performances by units have become cultural tourism products for visitors to Nha Trang - Khanh Hoa. Artists, actors, and artisans participating in these activities are mainly to practice their profession and perform for the audience. However, for a long time, artisans, artists, and actors have only been paid for their performance, but have not had any funding for training and staging. Therefore, there are few changes in the performance programs in terms of repertoire, form of expression, art form, etc. This has led to street art performances becoming increasingly stale.

The performance "Old man carrying his wife to see the festival" was performed by artists from the Provincial Traditional Arts Theater in the form of street art.

Need to change in a comprehensive way

Recently, in a meeting on organizing street art performances chaired by Mr. Dinh Van Thieu - Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, representatives of a number of agencies and localities agreed that in order for this activity to achieve the expected results, there needs to be a comprehensive change in both content and operation methods. "Street art performances need to be expanded in a diverse direction in terms of content, form, art types, and performing forces so that organizations, unions, and localities also have forces participating in the performance and bringing colors and atmosphere in accordance with the spirit of street art. To do so, there needs to be a comprehensive plan," Mr. Nguyen Thanh Ha - Chief of Office of the Provincial People's Committee suggested.

According to Mr. Phan Thanh Liem - Vice Chairman of Nha Trang City People's Committee, in the short term, it is necessary to organize more small performance venues so that people and tourists can easily watch and participate. In the long term, there needs to be a specific project, in which the participation of localities, agencies, units, and organizations is mobilized to enrich and diversify the types and forms of street art performances to attract public attention, creating a vibrant cultural and artistic atmosphere at night.

Mr. Dinh Van Thieu requested that, in the immediate future, the Department of Culture and Sports should propose and specifically advise the Provincial People's Committee to remove the difficulties and obstacles that the units are facing. In the long term, the Department of Culture and Sports should quickly develop a draft project to organize nighttime street art performances in accordance with the Project on Nighttime Economic Development in the province until 2030, which has just been approved by the Provincial People's Committee, because in the content of the project, cultural and entertainment services are one of the four main product groups to develop the nighttime economy. Nha Trang City must also have a project to enhance the local brand, clearly showing cultural and artistic activities in general and at night in particular.

In the first 6 months of 2023, the Provincial Traditional Arts Theater performed 59 street art performances in both folk opera and classical art forms; the Provincial Cultural - Cinema Center performed 48 bai choi singing sessions and 48 street music performances.

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