Born in 1980 in Thai Nguyen Province, Vietnam, Ha Manh Thang is based in Hanoi. A graduate of the Hanoi University of Fine Arts, his ‘Red Faces’ portrait series were successfully exhibited by Dong Phong Gallery in Hanoi and by Ernst and Young in Singapore in 2008. Followed by a landscape series, ‘The Rain and Small Streams’. He has exhibited internationally including Berlin, Budapest, Stuttgart and New York. Ha Manh Thang’s work is represented in the collection of the Singapore Art Museum.
Ha Manh Thang has been described by Galerie Quynh in HCMC as “one of Vietnam’s most important young painters”. He came to prominence with his colorful and sarcastic series of paintings addressing issues of tradition and modernity and the influence of consumerism since Doi Moi.
His current work looks at iconic architectural structures in Vietnam, reducing them to their essential forms, isolating them from their contexts and calling into question their roles and meanings.
In the upcoming Grapevine Selection exhibition, Thang will present 5 brand new paintings using acrylic, oil and charcoal on paper at a smaller size than what were exhibited at Galerie Quynh in April this year. This series, entitled “Far in the North”, continue the theme displayed earlier, in which he painted directly on the architectural drawings of the temples in the North of Vietnam.
Talking about the series, Thang stated:
“The paintings in “Far in the North” still follow the theme of “Vietnam’s landscape” that I’ve been working on for the last 3 years. However, the background of reality in this new series has totally disappeared and I only painted the temples and pagodas in the Northern countryside areas of Vietnam based on their architectural drawings and a bit of real context that is left on them (…)”
Ha Manh Thang’s artworks, old and new, can be viewed at his website: http://hamanhthang.com/
Also read KVT’s review and photos of Thang’s exhibition “Heaven is a place” at Galerie Quynh in April 2013: Ha Manh Thang @ Galerie Quynh
Words by KVT and Friderike Krentz.
Source: Hanoi Grapevine
