Women and landscape in Nguyen Gia Tri's paintings

On March 30, the painting Le Trois Femmes (Three Women) by famous artist Nguyen Gia Tri had the highest price at the auction organized by Christie's with 16.1 million HKD (more than 2 million USD), equivalent to 53 billion VND. The work uses oil paint, which is considered rare in Nguyen Gia Tri's creative career. Photo: Christie's

Nguyen Gia Tri Born in 1908 in Chuong My, Hanoi, graduated from the Indochina College of Fine Arts in 1936. He is one of the Four Great Masters of Vietnamese Painting (first Tri, second Van, third Lan, fourth Can), considered one of the leading painters in creating a new trend of lacquer art. He passed away in Ho Chi Minh City in 1993, and was posthumously awarded the Ho Chi Minh Prize for Literature and Arts in 2012.

The famous painter contributed to bringing Vietnamese lacquer to its peak with the combination of traditional Asian cultural elements on lacquer material and Western academic painting methods. The themes in his works are often women and landscapes.

The painting Spring Garden of Central, South and North - a national treasure in 2013 - is composed of nine panels, depicting the spring atmosphere with images of young women from three regions wearing traditional costumes attending festivals and going to pagodas at the beginning of the year. Photo: Vietnam Fine Arts Museum

During his lifetime, when talking to writer Duong Nghiem Mau, Nguyen Gia Tri said that the 20 young women in the work symbolized 20 springs - the time the painting was completed (1969-1989). Art researcher Ngo Kim Khoi commented that the lacquer painting has a brilliant beauty with a spring-like scene.

The screen - a national treasure of 2017 - has on the front a work called Young Women in the Garden, depicting seven female characters of various ages. Photo: Vietnam Fine Arts Museum

In the right corner of the painting are two little girls playing, on the left are three young women walking arm in arm under a banana tree. Near the middle of the painting, a middle-aged woman sits under a hibiscus tree. In the center is an elderly person enjoying tea.

The artist uses many complex lacquer techniques. On the screen surface, he embosses many details in different heights, thicknesses, and thinnesses such as banana leaves, hibiscus flowers, clouds, and young girls' ao dai, creating a blocky effect.

Lacquer painting In the Garden, size 121.5x171 cm. In 2015, the work was hammered by Larasati (Singapore) for 134,200 SGD, equivalent to 2.2 billion VND at that time. Photo: Larasati

Artist Nguyen Gia Tri painted Young Girl by Lotus Pond in the late 1930s and early 1940s, when he was at his prime. The work is currently owned by artist Bui Quang Ngoc. According to documents, this is the first lacquer painting in Vietnam to apply the eggshell inlay technique to a human face.

The painting Young Girl with Hibiscus Flowers was painted by Nguyen Gia Tri in 1944. He depicted the gentle beauty of young Vietnamese girls next to the blooming hibiscus flowers, creating a peaceful scene, blending people and nature. In the painting, the famous artist used mother-of-pearl, gold, and silver inlay techniques, painting through many layers of polished and smoothed paint to create the effect of light and depth. Photo: Collected by Duc Minh

In early January 2023, the painting Village among banana trees was hammered for 1.08 million USD (25.5 billion VND) at Drouot Estimations. Photo: Drouot

On a black background, the artist depicts thatched houses and a group of women wearing traditional Vietnamese dresses carrying shoulder poles. In the foreground, banana trees painted in red and gold create a strong contrast.