Patching and painting on old banknotes.

Despite dropping out of his fine arts program at Hue College of Education, Nguyen Van Truong (22 years old, residing in Da Nang City) still surprises many with his artistic talent, being able to restore ancient banknotes by realistically redrawing the missing lines.

Truong recounted that, as someone passionate about collecting antique banknotes, he felt truly heartbroken when he held rare and valuable notes in his hands but found them damaged, faded, or missing corners. Using his artistic talent, Truong taught himself how to restore these banknotes.

The image shows a 30 dong banknote, once part of Vietnam's monetary history, with torn corners, restored by Nguyen Van Truong.

"The first step in reviving old banknotes is to find the old paper, which consists of pages printed in the 1960s. Restoring a torn banknote to its original condition requires many steps," Truong said.

First, the torn part must be patched with paper, then the banknote is pressed to stiffen it and give it a rough texture. To make the banknote look natural, tools are used to thin the paper so that the seams are not visible to the naked eye.

Next, press the paper flat. The final step is to redraw the missing lines on the section that has just been attached to the original banknote. This is also the most difficult step.

The school used homemade bamboo pens to redraw the missing lines on an old banknote.

After years of practicing the technique of hand-painting on joined pieces, Truong discovered that, to achieve delicate and sharp lines, the tools also had to be handcrafted. And he chose bamboo with a thin, sharpened tip to make his paintbrushes.

Another particularly difficult task was finding the perfect color palette for each antique banknote. It took Trường a whole year of experimenting with color mixing before he discovered the secret to achieving consistent colors.

Thanh Nien newspaper invites readers to discover the unique "technology" of reviving ancient banknotes by young man Nguyen Van Truong:

First, you need to prepare old paper that was used to print books during the 1960s.

Only old paper is suitable for mending old coins.

Press paper onto the old banknotes that need restoration.

Use a paper scraper to blend the patched paper into the banknote so that it is undetectable to the naked eye.

The patched, straightened, and flattened banknotes are now ready for the redrawing process.

Sharpen bamboo pencils with extra-sharp tips for drawing.

The final step is meticulously redrawing each missing line on the newly patched piece of paper.

Below are some images of torn and damaged banknotes being "restored" to their original condition by Nguyen Van Truong:

Besides restoring ancient banknotes, Nguyen Van Truong also revives old documents that hold significance and value for many families.

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/va-va-ve-tien-giay-co-thu-choi-doc-dao-cua-chang-trai-10x-185241015235540174.htm