PRENTA Recommended Artist｜Lieu Nguyen

The artist recommended by PRENTA in this issue is Vietnamese contemporary artist Lieu Nguyen, who is a member of the Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts Association and teaches at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Fine Arts.

Lieu Nguyen, male, born in Tra Vinh, Vietnam in 1975, graduated from Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts University in 2001 and accepted a teaching position there after graduation. In 2003, he became a member of Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts Association and was awarded a certificateof merit at the 2000 Asia Pacific Contemporary Fine Arts Exhibition.

“I often ask my paintings whether they dreamed me into existence or if it is the other way around. We live together and yet we are alone, both following our own path and bearing our own destiny. They step into infinity without any reason and do not return. Thinking while they go, listening to their footsteps as they echo in the silence, an immense silence in an endless abyss. Where are they going? They struggle for life but cannot change their destiny except through the intervention of a miracle…perhaps they wait for a promise of happiness to come.”

To create my artworks give me memorable moments. The paintings and myself share our innermost compassion. To me, imagination which has kind of strange power is always more interesting than reality. Perhaps, it is a world of my own, those beautiful landscapes are mine or because I am living in the world of landscapes. They reveal a vigorous strength of life, natural, no purpose, serene yet lonely.

Spring, summer, autumn, winter then spring again. I wallow myself in forests, flowers where life is vibrant the most at every moment. There,I sense the beauty of nature, a true friend who never asks for anything else than exposing its purifying beauty.