Month: June 2014

Uzbekistan Rediscovers Lost Culture in the Craft of Silk Road Paper Makers

“Uzbekistan Rediscovers Lost Culture in the Craft of Silk Road Paper Makers”

by Komila Nabiyeva via “Guardian Weekly

Zarif Mukhtarov’s dream came true. He is standing in front of his workshop in the village of Koni Ghil, 5km from the Uzbek city ofSamarkand. His eyes shine with pride as he tells his story. Mukhtarov, 58, had tried for years to discover the lost art of Samarkand paper-making. Today, visitors to one of the only workshops for handmade paper in Central Asia can learn the secrets of a 1,000-year-old production process.

Samarkand paper was renowned for its quality. Many Persian and Arabic manuscripts of the ninth and 10th centuries were written on it. “The world’s best paper is produced in Samarkand,” wrote Babur, a descendant of the Central Asian ruler Tamerlane and founder of theMughal dynasty in India in the 16th century.

It was betrayal that brought the paper-making craft to Samarkand. In the year 751 the Chinese invaded Central Asia, but the ruler of Samarkanddefeated their troops and captured many thousands of soldiers. To save their lives, the story goes, craftsmen among the captives revealed their knowledge of paper-making to their captors. From then on, Samarkand became a centre for paper production. But following Russian colonisation of the Silk Road city in the 19th century and the start of industrial production, the ancient recipe got lost.

In 1995 Mukhtarov, a professional ceramist, took part in a UN conference dedicated to lost culture in Uzbekistan. Samarkand paper was one of the topics, and he started to dream of rediscovering how to make it. After five years of experiments with cotton, rag waste and flax, Mukhtarov became convinced that the best paper was made from the bark of the mulberry tree, which grows all over Samarkand.

In 2001 he started to build his own paper workshop. Some funding was provided by US and Japanese foundations, but most of the money was invested by Mukhtarov himself.

“At first my friends thought I was insane,” he recalls. “My wife scolded me regularly. We had to [save enough money to] marry both our children and I kept borrowing money for the workshop. At the end, I had to sell our car and my wife’s gold jewellery to finish the construction.”

Today the paper workshop is a must-see site for tourists coming to Uzbekistan. Mukhtarov has no website and does not advertise. Yet, each year some 5,000 visitors seek out his picturesque mud-brick workshop with a chattering wooden watermill by the Siyob river. The location was no coincidence; once, there were 400 watermills around Samarkand, many of them in Koni Ghil, Mukhtarov says.

Visitors find a variety of products: silk-like or hairy paper in cream, blue, yellow or pink; notepads and wallets; even puppets and masks. All of them are made of paper. Mukhtarov’s workers even produce Uzbek costumes with traditional embroidery. . . . .

“Hanoi Girl Digs Deeper into Vietnam Cultural Strata”

Very Impressive! **DB

“Hanoi Girl Digs Deeper into Vietnam Cultural Strata”

by TUOITRENEWS

“A Hanoi girl has initiated a program to help her like-minded peers delve deeper into Vietnam’s traditional cultural art heritage and arouse their pride in it.

In June 2012, Nguyen Thu Ha, nicknamed Ha Lemy, founded a project called “Toi Xe Dich” (I move), a nonprofit project to help young people like herself explore further the country’s traditional art items and cultural relics and matters.

A graduate of Hanoi Foreign Trade University, Ha was named runner-up of the 2012 “60s chinh phuc nha dau tu” (60s Contest), a playground launched by Viet Youth Entrepreneurs (VYE) to encourage students to display their knowledge, express their opinions, and improve their English skills.

Right after the contest, she expanded her “Vietnam Travel Radio” project, which she submitted to the contest, into “toixedich.com,” focusing more on promoting the country’s culture and art among local youths and tourists.

“Infatuated with the country’s culture and art, I believe that ‘moving’ here isn’t limited to trips taken by many of today’s youths. Each of ‘Toi Xe Dich’ trips is a reflective journey to explore and look back on time-honored traditional values. The trips turn participants’ pride into motivation to contribute to the country later,” Ha, who now works as a marketing agent for a local company, talked about her project.

Some hundreds of local youths have joined Ha’s various activities, including “Windy Day” trips around Hanoi and to Laos, visits to Hanoi’s icons Van Mieu – Quoc Tu Giam (the country’s first university) and historically significant Long Bien Bridge, and “Viec Lang” (Village Matters) talks discussing a wide variety of cultural matters in great depth.

With only some ten youths partaking in her first activity in the beginning, her trips now draw over 300 young cultural, art buffs each. . . . .”

A Legacy of War: Fake Art in Vietnam

Old Article but Still Interesting **DB

A Legacy of War: Fake Art in Vietnam

by Seth Mydans via “NY Times“

“HANOI, Vietnam — Even the director of the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum here doesn’t know how many of the artworks and artifacts under his care are genuine and how many are extremely skillful copies. But he says he is going to try to find out.

Many works at the Vietnam Fine Arts Museum could be copies that were made to replace the endangered originals during the Vietnam War. Now it is unclear which are real and which are fake.

Bui Thanh Phuong in his home, with works by his father, Bui Xuan Phai. He called the unmonitored art switch “a disaster.”There are nearly 20,000 of these mystery objects, on the walls and in storage, including paintings, sculpture, lacquerware, pottery, ancient statues and traditional crafts.

“We are making efforts to have a comprehensive review of items on display and in our warehouse,” said the director, Truong Quoc Binh. “After we evaluate the whole exhibit, we will try to label them all to show if they are original or not.”

Mr. Binh has been addressing questions about authenticity a lot lately. Curators and artists have been aware of the issue for years, but it became a matter of public discussion only in April, when it was raised at a conference on copyright in Danang.

In large part, the confusion is a legacy of the war with the United States, which ended in 1975, and to a lesser extent of a brief border war fought with China in 1979.

In the late 1960s, fearing that the United States would bomb Hanoi, then the capital of North Vietnam, museum officials removed hundreds of important artworks for safekeeping in the countryside.

To replace them on the museum walls, it commissioned copies: some by the original artists, some by the artists’ apprentices, some by skilled copyists in the museum’s restoration department. They were brilliant reproductions — or variants, as the Vietnamese called those paintings copied by the original artists.”

Coming Exhibition: Chinese Painting~ Legacy of the 20th Century Chinese Masters

“Chinese Painting~ Legacy of the 20th Century Chinese Masters”

“Summer” (1985) by Chu Teh-chun [Zhu Dequn]

Who:

Leisure and Cultural Services Dept.
Hong Kong Museum of Art
Musée Cernuschi
Asian Arts Museum of Paris
Musée National des Arts Asiatiques Guimet

When: June 13, 2014 – Sept. 21, 2014 (Sat.-Sun 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.)

Where:

Hong Kong Museum of Art
10 Salisbury Road
Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon, Hong Kong

How Much: Standard ($10) Seniors 60+ ($5) Students ($5)

More Information: Here.

“Paris has long been a European art and cultural hub where the liberal atmosphere enabled different streams of thought to burgeon and thrive, and since the 20th century this city has seen generations of Chinese artists hone their painting skills. Following the trend to learn from the West new ways of transforming traditional conventions, these artists left their motherland in search of inspiration. Visiting museums and learning under the guidance of masters, they acquired Western painting skills and perceptions, pioneering a revolution in Chinese painting art circles.

Artists like Liu Haisu, Xu Beihong, Lin Fengmian and Pan Yuliang left early for France. These young Chinese artists had a mission. After returning to China, they contributed immensely to the introduction of artistic trends from overseas, the development of oil painting and bouleversement of Chinese painting. They also founded fine arts schools in the country, cultivating in a new generation of painters the aspiration to further their studies in France. Among these students, Zao Wou-ki, Chu Teh-chun and Wu Guanzhong became well-known figures in the international art scene, anchoring the notion of ‘creating the art of an era’.

This exhibition showcases almost a hundred works, including oil paintings, Chinese ink paintings, sketches, lithographs, sculptures and more, demonstrating the impact and revelation of European art on 20th century Chinese painting. Exhibits have been composed from the collections of the Musée Cernuschi, Asian Arts Museum of Paris, the Hong Kong Museum of Art and several major institutions in France.

The Musée Cernuschi holds one of the finest Chinese art collections in France, and its Chinese painting collection comprises the works of various Chinese painters who travelled to France during the 20th century, illustrating their different practices and inclinations on the blending of Chinese and Western painting skills.”

“TRADITIONAL HERITAGE HOUSE IN SANA’A PLUNDERED AS YEMENI HERITAGE COMES UNDER INCREASING THREAT”

by Amal Al-Yarisi via “Yemen Times“

“Arwa Othman, head of the Traditional Heritage House in Sana’a, spent two years collecting traditional artifacts to fill the museum. She was devastated when it was robbed earlier last month. The padlocks were broken and glass windows were smashed. Important collectibles were found scattered around the house and precious silver items were missing, along with rare traditional clothes.

Established in 2004, Othman says the museum is one of a kind and contained important pieces of Yemen’s rich heritage. Museums in Hadramout, Seyoun, and Al-Dhale have also been robbed in the past, Othman said.

“On May 16, I was surprised to find the house robbed by unknown individuals. Some other collectibles were tampered with. So far, we have not identified who did it,” said Othman. The problem of robberies is particularly acute at the moment, given that the government’s hands are full in dealing with multiple crises and it cannot pay much attention to matters of heritage. What happened to the Traditional Heritage House is a case in point.

Othman said the house is a cultural entity that was formed to help safeguard the spiritual and material heritage of Yemen. She said she aims to preserve it and make it accessible to researchers.

Othman has been interested in Yemen’s history since she was a teenager. She used to save her allowance and buy traditional collectibles. “Every time my family gave me YR50 ($0.23), I headed to the market in Taiz where I was living. I used to buy many old items,” Othman recalled. . . . .”