Twelve year old girl
wins top prize in environment painting contest

Tran Truc Linh, a twelve-year old girl from Ho Chi Minh city
was awarded the first prize in the painting contest entitled ‘Bau Vat Rung
Xanh’ (Jungle Treasure) at an awards ceremony held on June 1 in Ho Chi Minh
City.

The winning painting named ‘People are Friends of the
One-Horned Rhinoceros, is inspired by the death of a one-horned rhino that was
shot in the leg in Cat
Tien National
Park last year. Through the painting, Linh wants
to call on people, and especially children, to join hands to protect the rhino
and other animals.

The contest which was launched by Wildlife at Risk (WAR) in
collaboration with the Khan Quang Do (Red Scarf) newspaper in March to mark
World Environment Day (June 5) received more than 1,000 paintings from children
nationwide.

Vietnamese culture in
Belgian eyes

A documentary film named, “A different Vietnam” by Belgian film-maker Marcel Wynands
was screened at the Lakilon Cultural Centre in Liege city, Belgium on June
1, opening Vietnamese Culture Week in the city.

The film features Vietnam’s
diversified culture through a vision of the daily life of ethnic minority
people in the northern mountainous province
of Ha Giang, from paddy
fields to market days and local people’s traditional clothes.

Marcel Wynands said he and his film-making delegation spent
eight days completing the documentary in the northernmost province.

Prior to the screening, an exhibition displaying 30
paintings by Overseas Vietnamese artists was staged.

Vietnam civilization depicted in book

A book about the material civilization of the Vietnamese
people, by painter and fine arts researcher Phan Cam Thuong, has been made
available to readers in Hanoi.

Entitled Van Minh Vat Chat Cua Nguoi Viet (Material
Civilization of Vietnamese People), the book is the product of Thuong’s 20
years of research and six years of writing. The completed book has 664 pages.

With 959 photos and 505 illustrations, the book features
stories about several objects made and used by the Vietnamese people.

Humans have created a material world and continue to shape
this world, said the author. The material civilization of objects plays a
significant role in the human development process.

To collect the necessary material for the book, Thuong
conducted several field studies in different regions across the country. He
travelled from the northern Red River Delta, to the central and southern
regions. He also visited China,
Japan and the US for his
research.

A peek into Indochina ethnic societies

A exhibition of photographs depicting the daily life and
cultural activities of ethnic minority peoples in Indochina opens in the
central city of Hue city
Sunday.

“Faces of Asian ethnic groups” will feature black and white
photos taken by French photographer Sébastien Laval in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue,
Cambodia’s Siem Riep, and
Luang Prabang in Laos.

They include portraits of ethnic people and reflect their
traditional customs and changes in their lives. Many of them will be untitled,
allowing viewers to draw their own conclusions and figure out the differences
between the three locations.

Sébastien Laval arrived in Vietnam for the first time in 1995.
Most of his photos are about Vietnamese ethnic minorities, and he is currently
involved in a project to publish a photo book featuring the country’s 54
minorities.

The exhibition at New Space Arts Foundation, 15 Le Loi Street,
will run until July 7.

PV