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THINKING PICTURES
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Found Object + Ready Made
Accidental imitation of a Duchamp ready made as an impromptu urban installation. I found this image in Saigon, where everything is the...
cnualart
Feb 19, 20131 min read
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Saigon by bicycle
I took my bicycle and my little camera for a ride today. It’s not just art that thrills the eye-to-mind synapses. Within Saigon city...
cnualart
Feb 12, 20131 min read
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Happy Year of the Snake!
Today Vietnam celebrates the Chinese New Year, and Saigon, the biggest city, is the only place where I have seen red hearts pop out of...
cnualart
Feb 10, 20131 min read
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Does Contemporary Vietnamese Art still have something to say? Part 1 of 3 by Laurent Colin
This essay, originally written in French by Laurent Colin, was first published in Vietnamese on the art discussion website Soi.com.vn....
cnualart
Dec 22, 20128 min read
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Does Contemporary Vietnamese Art still have something to say? Part 2 of 3 by Laurent Colin
Return to part 1 of this essay here. Continue to part 3 here. Artists as victims of their environment? To explain the current slump in...
cnualart
Dec 22, 20129 min read
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Does Contemporary Vietnamese Art still have something to say? Part 3 of 3 by Laurent Colin
Read part 1 of this essay here, and part 2 here. An Art under foreign diktat but which escapes criticism In this context, one can assert...
cnualart
Dec 22, 201210 min read
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The Gold Digger Ate my Homework
This little painting is my donation to the Arts For Mobility art auction that will take place this Saturday in the Saigon Opera House....
cnualart
Nov 15, 20121 min read
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Biodiversity as a flattened cage – the drawings of Johanna Calle
Colombian artist Johanna Calle just opened her exhibition of material-happy drawings in San Art, Saigon, where I spoke to her before she...
cnualart
Sep 14, 20123 min read
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Art for wheelchairs
In December 2011, I helped organise an art auction at the Saigon Opera as part of the Arts For Mobility annual event. Â I was delighted...
cnualart
Jul 17, 20121 min read
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Six degrees of connection
A short-lived private exhibition in Saigon opened and closed in little more than 24 hours. A group of artists living in HCMC, including...
cnualart
Jul 7, 20121 min read
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Red scars and blue dust. Deodorant-free installation art.
The world’s landfills have been dusted with the discarded union jacks that briefly saluted the Queen of England’s jubilee last fortnight....
cnualart
Jun 25, 20123 min read
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When forged paintings could do a better job
I’ve loved all my art history lecturers. All of them were brilliant speakers. It is not clear if it was their passion for the subject or...
cnualart
May 31, 20122 min read
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KCBT and KCAT wall painters and plasterers
Recently a Hanoi art exhibition by Lolo Zazar showcased paintings that are directly inspired by these hybrids between graffiti and...
cnualart
May 11, 20121 min read
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The last hand-painted sign in Saigon
Sometime in my first year of living in Saigon I came across a key-cutter at work at his small metal cart on a pavement. He’d borrowed...
cnualart
Apr 18, 20123 min read
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Ironies of ‘the female condition’
Below are my digital drawings currently on show in Cúnhouse Lounge. I like seeing and capturing funny anecdotes. The poem and...
cnualart
Mar 8, 20121 min read
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3D sketchbook: an archive of the artist’s inspiration
Zerostation is a Saigon-based arts organisation that aims to connect Vietnamese and international art practitioners. It regularly holds...
cnualart
Feb 25, 20122 min read
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The art of freedom
Tu Do (pronounced tuyo), Vietnamese for freedom, is the name of the first art gallery in South Vietnam. It opened in the newly named Ho...
cnualart
Dec 10, 20112 min read
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The art of freedom
Tu Do (pronounced tuyo), Vietnamese for freedom, is the name of the first art gallery in South Vietnam. It opened in the newly named Ho...
cnualart
Dec 10, 20112 min read
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Arts For Mobility at Saigon Opera House
Yesterday an annual art exhibition and silent auction helped raise money to give disabled people in Vietnam a wheelchair. Arts For...
cnualart
Dec 4, 20112 min read
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DomestiCity: visual research on domestic activities in dense urban areas
This photo essay was featured on Urban Asia Week, on ThisBigCity, a sustainable urbanism project. I live in Ho Chi Minh City, the largest...
cnualart
Oct 31, 20113 min read
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THE MADWOMAN, a poem by Hoang Hung
THE MADWOMAN Carrying a broken stick on her head she walks and sings Evening comes gradually at the end of the street She walks and...
cnualart
Jan 25, 20161 min read
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Saigon’s artworld – sketches in ‘Masque & Spectacle’
The July 2015 issue of literary and arts journal Masque and Spectacle is devoted to Vietnam, and features a few of my sketches done...
cnualart
Jun 6, 20151 min read
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