Paintings

.. . Even in the turbulence of a rapidly changing world, the Vietnamese countryside remains steeped in history and tradition. The old ways remain fixed in the minds of many people who feel that the past is disappears, so, too, does the emotional security that tradition and history provide. The attraction of the countryside, of its rich history and traditions, to Vietnamese artists, of all generations working today, is profound indeed. The reality of another time and place far from the cacophony of change lends itself to reverie, to speculation and to deep emotional attachment. Artists of the city, with little or no experience of the countryside, speak to a bright, modern urban world that is seemingly on the move all the time, draining the energy of the people daily. The draw of countryside and landscape resides deep within the collective Vietnamese memory in a manner that has long been lost to most Western societies. A young artist such as Pham Kien Giang finds the drama in the rolling fields and hills, in the bucolic rhythm of rivers, and streams inspire him, to record a passing world. The dissonance of the city is something that rarely touches his work. It sits uncomfortably on the periphery of his art, his life, and his consciousness. His reverie is of time past, of a time and place where the embrace of tradition is not a dream but a still reality. . . [robert C. Watson, Asian Art News July / August 2006. Volume 16, number 4]