Mona Lisa version of Mai Trung Thu and Vietnamese cultural values ​​in the global flow

Public opinion is abuzz with the news that the Mai Trung Thu version of Mona Lisa has just been hammered for more than 5 billion VND.

Mona Lisa by Mai Trung Thu was just auctioned for about 5.4 billion VND at Sotheby's Singapore auction. Photo: luxuo.vn

Recently, at the Modern and Contemporary Art auction of Sotheby's Singapore, the 1958 "Mona Lisa" by artist Mai Trung Thu was hammered for 304,800 SGD (equivalent to about 5.4 billion VND).

Public opinion was stirred up because this was a huge hammer price for a painting by a Vietnamese artist at international art auctions up to this point.

This is also the third Mona Lisa by Mai Trung Thu to appear on the market (all three have been auctioned at Sotheby's) with the proportions respecting the original in Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa".

Mai Trung Thu (1906-1980) was a Vietnamese painter living in France and was deeply influenced by the Renaissance masters. He is considered a painter with a strong national spirit, imbued with Vietnamese culture and always concerned with preserving Vietnamese identity. This is one of the reasons why he "Vietnamized" many famous works of Western painting, of which Mona Lisa is a typical example.

Mai Trung Thu's "Vietnamization", also known as "The Art of Image Appropriation", is currently very popular in many fields in Vietnam and the world . Of course, "appropriation" is causing a lot of controversy regarding copyright.

The "appropriation" trend began in 1919, when French artist Marcel Duchamp published a postcard. Coincidentally, the postcard also depicted the Mona Lisa, but with a thin mustache and goatee added to her face as a challenge to the traditional artistic methods of the time.

Back to the 1958 Mona Lisa painting, Mai Trung Thu version. In addition to the value of about 5.4 billion VND at the hammer price, this painting has real value when it is considered one of the 13 most outstanding Indochina-era works at the recently concluded Modern and Contemporary Art auction of Sotheby's Singapore.

The value of the 1958 Mona Lisa Mai Trung Thu version is the values ​​of Vietnamese culture, Eastern culture, expressed in a Mona Lisa with black hair, willow eyes, wearing a deep red Le Mur ao dai and a moss-colored silk veil that extends down her body.

Based on the original, she sits on a wooden chair on the balcony, with the design of the chair and the balcony both featuring oriental motifs. The scene behind is also projected from the original, with the expression combining Western oil painting and Eastern ink painting…

The value and worth of the 1958 Mona Lisa version by Mai Trung Thu is a living example of integration, assimilation and promotion of cultural values ​​of Vietnam and the world.

This example once again shows: Vietnamese culture always has its own values. However, to promote and stand shoulder to shoulder... it must be placed and collided in the right place in the flow of human culture, not going out with the mindset of "we are one, we are separate, we are first" as a poetic declaration by Xuan Dieu!

laodong.vn