NGUYEN THI CHAU GIANG

Nguyen Thi Chau Giang was born in Hanoi in 1975 and graduated from the Ho Chi Minh City College of Fine Arts in 1998. Nguyen Thi Chau Giang looks back to her Vietnamese artistic roots as she explores the formal issues of traditional silk painting. In constructing her visual narratives, Giang draws on sources both classic and contemporary as she mediates on the typical Vietnamese feminine archetype. Well versed in feminist theories that impact contemporary Vietnamese society, she resists infiltrating her work with the seduction of poetic embellishments as she circumvents typical romantic narratives commonly associated with Vietnamese silk painting. All of these works explore the fragility of relationships and emotions with a sensitive eye, and they are engaging for that reason. But their formal deftness is also remarkable, as is the richness of their pictorial nuance, which amplifies the psychological interest of the works without drifting into melodrama. Silk paintings originated in China, and a handful of Vietnamese artists have adopted the art form to produce compelling contemporary art works.