Colourful art by children from the northern mountainous province of Ha Giang is on display at an exhibition in the capital.
Theexhibition is the result of a charity art project initiated byTaiwanese student Kuo Yen Wei, who is pursuing his PhD degree inVietnamese Studies at Hanoi National University.
The ideafor the project came to Wei in 2013, when he travelled to Ha Giang toresearch the culture in the remote mountainous area.
"Duringthat trip I realised that local ethnic people maintained theirtraditional customs very well. However, many people still have tostruggle for their daily life and they ignore the importance ofpreserving tradition. Moreover, the modern world is encroaching on theirtraditional way of life, especially affecting children, who will haveto deal with this more and more as they grow up," Wei said.
He also noticed that most of the children displayed a lack of self-confidence.
He said: "They reject their ethnic cultural identity and many of them even do not use their own ethnic language."
Wei,who is also an art curator, and his fellow travellers decided todevelop a fine art teaching programme that would raise the culturalawareness of children in Ha Giang and help them build self-esteem.
The project kicked off in July at three schools in Ha Giang's Quan Ba District.
Threehundred children aged 8-11 attended classes taught by professionalartists and participated in other traditional activities like paperfolding and folk games.
They also learned more about their ethnic culture and origin through storytelling sessions by village elders.
"Wewant to encourage the children to expose their natural personalitythrough art. They can draw whatever they think about: family, village,their future dreams," said painter Phan Thong Nguyen, one of thevolunteer lecturers.
"We tried our best to turn the class into a place where the children could play or do creative things."
Thevolunteer lecturers and project coordinators also visited the houses ofunderprivileged pupils and offered them practical gifts.
StudentPhan Thi Mai Quyen came to Hanoi for the first time to attend theexhibition opening on October 25, wearing her traditional Pu Y dress.
"My friends and I were given a box of coloured crayons. The tutors taught us to draw moving objects," she said.
Her classmate Nguyen Thi Minh Thu said she cancelled a trip to visit her grandparents to join the art class.
Visitor Tran Quang Minh said he appreciated the social meaning of the project and was also impressed by the vivid drawings.
"Thedrawing class aims to encourage children to express themselves. I thinkit was successful because I can see the lack of constraint andstraightforwardness – typical personal characters of ethnic people –through these childish strokes."
For project initiator Wei, the exhibition is just the beginning of a long road.
"Improvingthe cultural life of local people in Ha Giang is something that wecan't do in a few days. We hope to get more sponsorship to expand theproject's scale so children in other region can benefit from theMountain Star charity programme," he said.
With financialsupport from sponsors, the project will hold a fundraising auctionfeaturing the children's drawings as well as paintings by the volunteerpainters.
The exhibition is open until October 29 atHeritage Space, Dolphin Plaza Tower, 28 Tran Binh Street, Tu LiemDistrict. It will also be brought to Ha Giang and Kaohsiung, Taiwan(China).-VNA
Theexhibition is the result of a charity art project initiated byTaiwanese student Kuo Yen Wei, who is pursuing his PhD degree inVietnamese Studies at Hanoi National University.
The ideafor the project came to Wei in 2013, when he travelled to Ha Giang toresearch the culture in the remote mountainous area.
"Duringthat trip I realised that local ethnic people maintained theirtraditional customs very well. However, many people still have tostruggle for their daily life and they ignore the importance ofpreserving tradition. Moreover, the modern world is encroaching on theirtraditional way of life, especially affecting children, who will haveto deal with this more and more as they grow up," Wei said.
He also noticed that most of the children displayed a lack of self-confidence.
He said: "They reject their ethnic cultural identity and many of them even do not use their own ethnic language."
Wei,who is also an art curator, and his fellow travellers decided todevelop a fine art teaching programme that would raise the culturalawareness of children in Ha Giang and help them build self-esteem.
The project kicked off in July at three schools in Ha Giang's Quan Ba District.
Threehundred children aged 8-11 attended classes taught by professionalartists and participated in other traditional activities like paperfolding and folk games.
They also learned more about their ethnic culture and origin through storytelling sessions by village elders.
"Wewant to encourage the children to expose their natural personalitythrough art. They can draw whatever they think about: family, village,their future dreams," said painter Phan Thong Nguyen, one of thevolunteer lecturers.
"We tried our best to turn the class into a place where the children could play or do creative things."
Thevolunteer lecturers and project coordinators also visited the houses ofunderprivileged pupils and offered them practical gifts.
StudentPhan Thi Mai Quyen came to Hanoi for the first time to attend theexhibition opening on October 25, wearing her traditional Pu Y dress.
"My friends and I were given a box of coloured crayons. The tutors taught us to draw moving objects," she said.
Her classmate Nguyen Thi Minh Thu said she cancelled a trip to visit her grandparents to join the art class.
Visitor Tran Quang Minh said he appreciated the social meaning of the project and was also impressed by the vivid drawings.
"Thedrawing class aims to encourage children to express themselves. I thinkit was successful because I can see the lack of constraint andstraightforwardness – typical personal characters of ethnic people –through these childish strokes."
For project initiator Wei, the exhibition is just the beginning of a long road.
"Improvingthe cultural life of local people in Ha Giang is something that wecan't do in a few days. We hope to get more sponsorship to expand theproject's scale so children in other region can benefit from theMountain Star charity programme," he said.
With financialsupport from sponsors, the project will hold a fundraising auctionfeaturing the children's drawings as well as paintings by the volunteerpainters.
The exhibition is open until October 29 atHeritage Space, Dolphin Plaza Tower, 28 Tran Binh Street, Tu LiemDistrict. It will also be brought to Ha Giang and Kaohsiung, Taiwan(China).-VNA
