HÀ NỘI — An exhibition on contemporary art will open to the public on December 10, marking a landmark event celebrating the pioneering Vietnamese artist Vũ Dân Tân, whose experimental vision helped shape the emergence of contemporary art in the 1990s in Việt Nam.

Entitled Vũ Dân Tân Citizen of the World – Forging Contemporary Art in 1990s Hà Nội, the exhibit tells the story of the art's debut and development during a decade of profound social and cultural transformation as the country globalised in the wake of the 1986 economic reform (Đổi Mới), at the Vũ Dân Tân Museum.

Tân (1946-2009) was a well-known figure in Hà Nội, where he spent much of his life.

From the 1970s, departing from local painting orthodoxies, he produced novel images and forms that would foreground his 1990s conceptually underpinned multimedia and pluridisciplinary expressive breakthroughs.

These included the installation series Suitcases of a Pilgrim, first shown internationally at the 1996 Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT2) at Queensland Art Gallery in Australia, and his performative installation with a 1961 Cadillac, Cadillac/Icarus, from RienCarNation, unveiled in 1999 at Pacific Bridge, Oakland, California, and transported to Hà Nội in 2000.

In addition to these two seminal bodies of work, Tân presented other key career series from the 1990s to 2000s.

Curated by specialist and art historian of Southeast Asian contemporary art Iola Lenzi, Vũ Dân Tân – Citizen of the World includes rare early-career works on paper from the 1970s, archival documents, films and performance relics, framing the major paintings and installations that define Tân’s artistic legacy as a trailblazer of contemporary art in Việt Nam.

The museum, opened to the public on December 5 at No 443 Ngọc Thụy Street, Long Biên Ward, was designed by architect Hoàng Lê and established to preserve, research, document and exhibit Vũ Dân Tân’s works for the benefit of the community.

Curator Iola Lenzi said the museum houses installations, sculptures, artifacts, paintings, drawings, prints and art books, as well as manuscripts of music and literature composed and compiled by Tân. These items allow local and international audiences to access previously unpublished works by the artist.

She added that the museum will host exhibitions, workshops and open studio programmes, alongside educational initiatives for a wide range of audiences, including tours, discussions, lectures, seminars and art dialogues, all aimed at sharing experiences and promoting research in the field of art.

Important works such as Cadillac/Icarus, Money and Suitcases of a Pilgrim will be on display until April 4, offering visitors a chance to understand Tân’s artistic vision and his engagement with contemporary art.

Tân is regarded as one of the pioneering figures in contemporary art in Việt Nam.

He produced work across multiple mediums but gained particular acclaim for his art objects and installations. Beyond his personal practice, he played a pivotal role in developing contemporary art in Việt Nam by establishing the first independent art space, ‘Salon Natasha’, which he co-founded with his spouse.

He began developing his independent artistic practice in the 1970s, experimenting with multimedia. By the early 1990s, Tân was producing a series of graphic works and household object-appropriating pieces that integrated text and subverted iconographies, creating works that engaged with an evolving contemporary Vietnamese society. 

Lenzi concluded that, characterised by formal freedom and semantic originality, through their conceptual-critical play, Tân’s pieces humorously but sharply probe various social and ethical issues emerging in globalising 1990s Việt Nam. VNS