Welcome to the November 2003 issue of Vietnam Art Gallery!

For this edition we'd like you to dress light and join us in leaving the big cities of Vietnam. Travel with us to two locations that offer insight into the beauty and diversity of Vietnam — a land known for its array of rural and metropolitan themes, many of which the artists within Vietnam Art Gallery depict so adeptly.

Come with us to the Love Markets of Sa Pa — home to the mountain tribes of the H'mong, Dao and Tay, and then on to the incredible vividity of Hué - once home to the great Purple Forbidden City and a little known paradise of visual splendors.

But first: we'd like to introduce you to Vietnam Art Gallery's feature works for November.

Che Cong Loc - My Sister 2 - $500

Che Cong Loc's latest work, "My Sister 2" makes you ponder the story behind the image. A beautiful girl on her way to or from school — or perhaps a destination slightly more sociable? Click here for more Che Cong Loc >>

Van Anh - Small Harvest - $180

Van Anh's "Small Harvest" dips the Vietnamese countryside in luminous yellows and greens. Click here for more from Van Anh >>

Hoang Minh - Kites - $300

Hoang Minh's kite chasers make even the oldest of limbs reinvigorated just by pondering their happy antics. Click here for more Hoang Minh >>

Nguyen Duy Nhi - New 30 - $130

A happy array of colour and form co-habit within Nguyen Duy Nhi's "New 30" - one of our most popular artists, Nguyen's definitive style is always affirming and positive. Click here for more Nguyen Duy Nhi >>

=== The Love Markets of Sa Pa: a piece of indigo embroiders the heart ===

The mountainous region of Northwestern Vietnam is known for the beauty of its lush, verdant scenery and the variety of its inhabitants and their striking ethnic dress.

Home to a variety of ethnic minority groups, the area around the town of Sa Pa is a popular destination for travelers wishing to see the colorful costumes and lively markets of such groups as the H'mong, Dao and Tay.

But everyone in the town, whether resident or tourist, can feel the week building to the region's main event: Saturday night, where the trade is in the promise of meeting a beloved: the Love Markets of Sa Pa.

Sa Pa is a frontier town, its couple of streets selling a jumble of farm implements, local fabrics and musical instruments. When we were there, the air was sharp with wood smoke, and the view beyond was of stepped paddy fields and distant blue mountains. Thronging the narrow streets in their distinctive clothes were young girls and women - most noticeably the Dao and the Black H'mong.

The Black H'mong live highest in the mountains, and are renowned for their musicality, songs and word-play. The women wear tunic-style dresses of hemp fabric, dyeing with natural indigo to a deep purple-black. They wear strips of indigo cloth as leggings, and stunning silver hooped bangles around their necks and arms. The Dao are from the lower mountains, more affluent and more colourfully dressed. They wear bright scarlet tabards overlaid with panels of embroidery and, after marriage, the women shave their hairline and wear a dazzling kind of tri-corn hat, decorated with silver and old French coins. The headpiece looks medieval and very striking.

There's a buzz to Sa Pa during the week as local people come and go, trading rice for chickens, orchard fruits for a bicycle tyre. But the highlight of Sa Pa is Saturday night and Sunday morning. Sunday is the big trading day and Saturday night is Love Market. The villagers walk or ride into town in their finery with the aim of meeting a handsome stranger; both young and old will case out the talent in the shadowy streets of the little town.

In H'mong ritual, the boy will sing to his chosen girl, describing his strength and endurance. She may trill back a couple of verses on her own beauty and ability to carry pails of water over long distances. She'll then let him take something from her dress - a thread of indigo, or piece of embroidery. At the end of the night, she can ask for it back. If she doesn't, the couple are free to spend three nights alone in the hills in conjugal bliss, after which she drags him home to meet mum and dad.

I talked to a smiling middle-aged Dao lady from a village some miles away. "I met someone here, 20 years ago," she said, "but it was not meant to be. Still, I often come back to see if he is still around, and to relive the romance."

After a frenzy of bartering on Sunday, I found myself the happy owner of a Dao bridal outfit, a pretty Flower H'mong checked and flowered shawl, and several indigo tunics, wraps and a "bottom-apron"- a square of fabric to protect your skirt when you sit on dirty ground.

I also met women from several hill villages who invited us to visit them at home. So we spent two days trekking through steep paddies, terraced sometimes 50-deep in the mountainside. It was spring, so the paddies were newly flooded, casting a silvery look as they reflected the mountain skies.

We visited a hamlet where women were pickling vats of ginger. Another family was making rice wine. At Catcat village, my friends from the market were busy dyeing fabric, "three times a day for a lunar month, to get the right blue". Everywhere, people tended their essential ploughing animal, the buffalo, scrubbing him down after a day in the muddy fields.

When I cut my hand I was very happy with the help of a H'mong lady, who mashed up some aromatic leaves and binded the sticky paste on to my fingers with threads of indigo pulled from her dress. The sting left me immediately.

While visiting Sa Pa, we had some indication of how the modern Vietnamese and the tribal peoples co-exist - Giang Seo Ga, the local commissar for culture, is a communist party member and an ethnic-minority H'mong to boot. While Giang wears a Mao-style suit, his wife dresses as a traditional Black H'mong. Giang and his wife still live in her home village in the mountains, and travel to Sa Pa regularly.

We asked: did Giang meet his wife at the Love Market? He smiled and giggled happily: yes, indeed. He was struck by her beauty and couldn't think straight after he saw her. He sang her a 32-verse ballad, which she liked enough to give him a piece of her indigo clothing. And so thirty years and four children later the rest, as they say, is history.

======= The Colours of Hué =======

I was in my favourite café nourishing myself with a fresh bowl of phó when the American at the next table, eyeing my backpack, asked "Where are you heading?" "I'm off to see Hué," I replied. "Hugh? Hugh who?" "You know, Hué, the old imperial capital of Vietnam," I insisted.

I invited him to leave Hanoi behind for a few days and indulge with me in the splendors of this exquisite city.

Hué had its heyday as the capital of Vietnam in the first half of the nineteenth century. The Nguyen dynasty began in 1802 and lasted until 1945, despite the stripping of its powers by the French in 1883. The Nguyen Emperor Gia Long was the first to unite the whole of Vietnam, a feat that wasn't to be achieved again until 1975.

But, whether or not my friend would become aware of the fact, it's the colors of Hué that startle and amaze the visitor.

Have you ever seen a street full of people in purple plastic raincoats? This color, usually reserved for cardinals and the "ultra-high" of the spectrum of humanity, has been appropriated by Hué as its civic theme-tint. The lowliest of houses are painted in subtle shades ranging from light purple to mauve.

This "passion for purple" comes from the colors of the Purple Forbidden City, in the inner sanctum of the Imperial City, built by Emperor Gia Long starting in 1804. Sadly, the Purple Forbidden City was razed to the ground during the Tet conflict of 1968; maybe this color is what the citizens of Hué are now trying to reclaim as their own.

Two other colors can widely be seen in this gracious city: the red-vermilion shades of old villas and school buildings, and the all-pervasive yellow ochre that colors the formerly French buildings and some Chinese temples. Occasionally you will also spot a light turquoise or sky-blue trim around verandahs and eaves, and the royal blue of the intricate carpets of Hué. Is it any wonder then that this city has been called "a color designer's dream" and "a masterpiece of urban construction"?

A brochure put out by the Hué Province Tourism Association (Cong Ty Du Lich Thua Thien Hué) says, of the people of Hué: "Their taste of color is quite special and unique. They have their own 5-color palette" (the brochure doesn't say what these colors are). "... (but) in real life, the palette is changed in various ways: red, green, blue, grey, dark violet, eggplant violet, sky blue, moon white and grass green."

So it's not just casual visitors who are bowled over by the colors of Hué! As the name "Hué" means "harmony", its citizens have long been serenaded in song and poetry. It has been said that natives of this city are "born poets and philosophers - sentimental but witty, simple but proud, and gentle but courteous".

It was raining when I visited Hué - not surprising in a city that has been known to register nearly three meters of rainfall in a single month. During a break in the downpour, I stopped to look at a group of stately old maroon-red buildings set around a beautiful garden courtyard. I walked into the grounds, and was greeted by Thi Lé ("little tear-drop"), a teacher of English. Soft-spoken, gracious and with a sweet disposition, she explained that this was a school for the top achievers of Hué Province, who come here to study in such colorful and pleasant surroundings that you could be forgiven for thinking it's a foretaste of heaven.

By the time I'd reached the Imperial Citadel, you'd have thought that all the color would have been washed out of the city. But no -- here was a whole group of French tourists, all in purple plastic raincoats -- and above them, the yellow crenelations of the Palace beaming out in splendor.

The Emperor's throne-room stuns, with lacquer upon lacquer of brilliance, in shades of cobalt blue, antique red, light purple and jade green. You feel that the Emperor still graces this room with his presence'and he surely doesn't care whether it's raining outside or not.

That evening, I took a stroll along the Perfume River (Huong Giang). An otherworldly mist hung over the banks of this serene river, and I recalled a Vietnamese description of this river as "soft and slender, like silver-green silk glittering under the sun."

My American friend did indeed seize the moment and travel with me to meet Hué - for all I know, he's still there, deciding as he did to stay awhile and prolong the moment of leaving the colours and splendor of this mostly unknown treasure of Vietnam.

============== Artist Roster ==============

Our database of up-and-coming artists has doubled in the last few months and we now have over 750 original art pieces in our database -- one of the largest virtual galleries on the Internet! Here's a rundown on the artists you'll find in our pages. Think you can pick the next Bui Xuan Phai?

*** New pieces this month ***

Subscription policy: You're receiving this information because you signed up at our website - http://www.vietnamartgallery.com. To be removed, simply reply to this message and let us know.