Young Artists and Woodcut Art

In the flow of contemporary fine arts, woodcuts are still a fairly new “territory” for the Long An (now Tay Ninh) painting community. Among the young faces who are persistently walking on the creative path with woodcuts, two artists stand out: Kim Ha and Ngoc Chuc. Both are passionate about woodcuts, but both have their own distinct highlights. While Kim Ha likes to put people in her paintings, Ngoc Chuc is attracted by spaces imbued with nostalgia.

"Want to draw things about emotions"

Graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts Education, Ho Chi Minh City University of Fine Arts, having tried many materials, artist Kim Ha finally realized that she had a special passion for wood carving. Ms. Kim Ha shared: “Wood carving requires meticulousness and detail, once carved, it is almost impossible to change the lines, unless you have to start over! But that difficulty makes me feel curious and excited, each work is a time for me to challenge myself with new experiences”.

Artist Kim Ha with a set of 3 woodcut paintings about the Ba Na people

Kim Ha's first woodcut was Return, depicting a beach with an emotional horizontal composition. This was followed by Loneliness and Warm Home, then a set of three paintings about the Ba Na people. Each work is a combination of meticulous woodcutting techniques, deep inner emotions, and was created by her while she was a student. Warm Home brought Kim Ha Third Prize at the 2024 Mekong Delta Fine Arts Exhibition, while Loneliness won the Encouragement Prize in 2023.

Each of Kim Ha's works is inspired by her own emotions and familiar, close things. If Loneliness was born when she was going through the days full of thoughts in her third year of university, Warm Home has the familiar breath of a small house in Da Lat. Kim Ha said: "The more I draw, the more I want to draw things that belong to real emotions, things that I love. For me, learning about woodcuts is like learning about my own emotions, I never feel like I have discovered everything."

Currently, having just graduated from university, Kim Ha works as a lecturer in Ho Chi Minh City and still spends time composing. She is making a wood carving about a corner of her hometown's rice fields, where she spent her childhood and where there are people she loves.

On the long journey, the young female artist hopes to go further, bring woodcuts closer to the public and affirm her position in the artistic life.

Preserving memories through paintings

Unlike Kim Ha's paintings, artist Nguyen Ngoc Chuc's woodcuts have a quiet and nostalgic feel. Graduated from Ho Chi Minh City University of Fine Arts in 2017, after experimenting with many different materials, like Kim Ha, artist Ngoc Chuc decided to pursue woodcuts on his artistic path. Ngoc Chuc confided: "Woodcutting requires meticulousness, calculating each printed layer, each engraved line, but it is that meticulousness that makes me love it, because each line holds a part of emotion, a part of memory."

Painter Ngoc Chuc with his oil painting A Peaceful Day

The woodcut painting Old Place, depicting the family's familiar house, helped Ngoc Chuc win Third Prize at the 2022 Mekong Delta Fine Arts Exhibition. This work was also selected to be displayed at the 2023 National Fine Arts Exhibition. It seems that the house, the porch, and the time-stained spaces are always an endless source of inspiration in Ngoc Chuc's paintings. Previously, in 2019, with the same theme, he won Third Prize at the Mekong Delta Fine Arts Exhibition with the oil painting A Peaceful Day.

Born with a passion for drawing, Ngoc Chuc's journey to art was not smooth. After studying Finance and Banking, he decided to "change direction" and study for the entrance exam to Ho Chi Minh City University of Fine Arts. That choice helped him satisfy his passion and start his journey to pursue woodcut painting as he does today. Now, in addition to teaching, artist Ngoc Chuc also spends a lot of time creating and cherishing plans to hold a solo exhibition in the future.

“I like to describe old things, simple things, stained by time. Sometimes it is just a corner of the porch, a small hut or a birdcage in the yard. When emotions naturally come, I want to preserve that in my paintings, especially with wood carvings. I feel there is a certain meeting in the simplicity and emotion between the subject and the material” - painter Ngoc Chuc shared.

To create a painting that fully conveys ideas and emotions, the artist must go through many meticulous steps. Each carving not only demonstrates technique but also preserves emotions, time and creative aspirations. And it is the perseverance of young faces that helps wood carvings gradually become a unique color in the province’s fine arts./.

Currently, the number of artists in the province pursuing the genre of woodcut paintings is not much, mainly concentrated in a number of young artists. Although quite new, woodcut paintings still have a certain position in the field of painting in the province when many works won awards at the Fine Arts Exhibition of the Mekong Delta region.

Head of the Fine Arts Association, Long An Province Literature and Arts Association (formerly) - painter Nguyen Van Tam

Guilin

Source: https://baolongan.vn/nhung-hoa-si-tre-va-nghe-thuat-tranh-khac-go-a201288.html