DONG HO PAINTING VILLAGE

DONG HO PAINTING VILLAGE

About 33km east of Hanoi and located close to the southern bank of the Duong River dike, Ho village or Dong Ho is a traditional craft village, whose Nom name is Mai village, now in Song Ho commune, Thuan Thanh district, Bac Ninh province. This is the cradle of a unique line of folk wood carvings known to many people both at home and abroad, with paintings that have long entered the spiritual life of many Vietnamese people. From Hanoi, if you want to go to Dong Ho, tourists go along Highway 5 (the road to Hai Phong) about 15km to Phu Thuy station, then turn left, continue about 18 km to reach Ho street, the district capital of Thuan Thanh district. From here, turn left and go about 2km further to reach Ho village. Visitors can also go all the way to Ho Street and then up the dike, turn left to the second dike guard post, there will be a sign pointing the way to Dong Ho. Dong Ho is a small village with more than 220 households, making a living from making paintings and votive goods more than farming, where the oldest way of making paintings in Kinh Bac land is preserved. Vietnamese folk songs have vivid depictions of Dong Ho painting village with the image of a simple village nestled on the gentle Duong River, outstanding with moral standards that have been advocated and preserved for many years. life, has created a unique way of behaving for the people of Mai village: respect for honor, integrity, elegant speech, clear communication from above and below, and rarely in the village do people curse loudly at each other... “Hey lady with the green sack belt If you come back to Mai village with me, then come back Mai Village has a calendar with margins There is a cool bathing pond and a profession of making paintings." Appearing around the 16th century, Dong Ho paintings are created by manual methods, the crystallization of ingenuity and patience, plus delicate aesthetic art... These are not painted paintings. inspired but reprinted through engravings, and to have engravings that reach a level of sophistication, requires the modeler as well as the engraver to have a love of art and a high technical level. Dong Ho paintings have up to 180 types divided into 5 main categories including worship paintings, historical paintings, congratulatory paintings, daily life paintings and comics. It can be said that the period from the second half of the 19th century to 1944 was the heyday of the painting village, with 17 families in the village participating in making paintings. During the years of resistance against the French, due to the fierce destruction of the war, the painting profession was temporarily interrupted. Only when peace is restored in the North, especially when the country is unified, will the painting village be restored. Unfortunately, after decades of innovation under the market economy and with the impact of Western art trends, social awareness and trends have also changed, forcing the Dong Ho painting line to face decline. one's own survival (!). Every year, from March to July, the whole village makes votive products, and from August to December, the Tet painting season is busy, the whole village is filled with colorful paper messages. In particular, Ho village has a festival on the full moon day of the third lunar month. During the village festival, there are traditional rituals such as sacrifices to gods, horse competitions, and very fun painting competitions... Among the known Vietnamese folk paintings such as Hang Trong (Hanoi), Kim Hoang (Hanoi - former Ha Tay), Dong Ho (Bac Ninh), Sinh village (Hue)..., Dong Ho paintings stand out. Thanks to being closely associated with the countryside, with the simple life of rural people, very close to the Vietnamese community... Dong Ho paintings are printed on Do paper, a type of paper handmade from the Do tree that grows in the forest like eucalyptus bark. Bring the Do tree home, put it in a mortar and pound it, sift it into fine powder, then use this powder to process it into Do paper. Because the paper base is often painted with a layer of paste or resin mixed with powder from crushed Scallop shells to create a sparkling color, it is also called Diep paper. The people of Ho village know how to use and refine natural materials to create traditional colors that are both fresh and durable, such as blue extracted from copper rust; Indigo is extracted from the leaves of the Cham tree in Lang Son; crimson color from the bark of the Vang tree; Vermillion red from gravel quarried in the mountains; yellow color from Hoe flowers or sticky rice straw; Black color from Xoan ash or Bamboo leaf ash; The shiny ivory white color of scallops is due to scallops made from snail shells or clamshells from Quang Ninh waters... These are basic colors, unmixed and each color corresponds to a wood engraving, so they are often painted. Dong Ho is limited to only four colors. Particularly, the topic is taken from life itself, production activities or comes from the philosophy of prosperity. Although simple, it is also very close to everyday life. From characters in legends or stories, beautiful scenes of the country's mountains and rivers, to paintings with meanings of wishes, and everyday activities such as "Vinh Hoa Phu Quy", "Coconut Picking", " Jealousy", "The Shepherd Plays the Flute", "The Mouse Wedding"..., all contain profound humanist philosophies. Not applying the principles of light or the near-far law of contemporary paintings with strict anatomical composition, artists create folk paintings using only a single line drawing style, creating the Eastern painting line. The lake has many conventional features in both description and composition, bringing viewers of the painting into the world of naive, simple but also very interesting drawings. Especially on each painting, the artist always writes a few Chinese or Nom characters (in the past) or romantic and love poems (nowadays), making the painting even more meaningful... Dong Ho paintings are quite close to rural life in the Red River Delta and northern provinces and cities. Its images have entered poetry, literature and even in school curricula. In the poem "Across the Duong River" Fortunately, thanks to the few people who are still passionate about making paintings, the paintings their family produces are sold, and occasionally foreign tourists come to buy paintings. Their income is also temporarily stable, giving them more motivation to continue preserving and developing their traditional profession. The good news is that after a period of following the trend of "trendy" paintings, many people were able to recognize the hidden beauty in the simplicity of folk paintings and returned to the hobby of playing and hanging Dong Ho paintings. especially during Tet days. Hopefully, together with Bac Ninh province, we will build a national candidate dossier for Dong Ho painting to submit to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for recognition as a world cultural heritage. Luckily, Dong Ho painting village will smile again so that Dong Ho paintings will forever retain their fresh and bright features on Diep paper... Source: Dong Ho folk paintings

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