A work from the 'Brain' series by David Thomas. — Photo vietnamplus.vn

HÀ NỘI — Việt Nam Fine Arts’ Association and Việt Nam Museum of Fine Arts co-ordinate to introduce artworks by American David Thomas and Vietnamese artists in Hà Nội.

The exhibition entitled David Thomas and Friends showcases selected graphic works from the series of Thomas during his struggle with Parkinson's in recent years. This disease resulted from having contact with Agent Orange in the American war in Việt Nam.

He uses digital printing to create visual images from his X-ray films of his brain and abstract designs featuring the battle with the disease.

“His works are meaningful messages to condemn the war and Agent Orange,” said veteran artist Lê Huy Tiếp.

“The display works by Thomas also reflect his fortitude and creativity. Showing his works and Vietnamese artists’ works together at the exhibition proves the healing power of art.”

Since 1988, Thomas and the Indochina Arts Partnership (IAP) has been known for organising cultural and artistic exchanges between Việt Nam and the US, especially with large-scale significant exhibitions right before and after the normalisation of relations between the two countries in 1995.

He has made great and important contributions to initiating and sustaining activities that healed and built mutual understanding between the two nations that used to have a common painful past.

Thomas joined the US troops participating in the American war in Việt Nam in 1969. He returned to Việt Nam in 1987 to reconnect and reconcile the past. He founded the non-profit IAP, a cultural and artistic diplomatic bridge between Việt Nam and the US.

"Vietnam-War seems to become a common phrase, a constant thought that anchored in every American’s consciousness," Thomas said at the exhibition opening ceremony.

"But I found the beauty of the land and the people, the poetic, beautiful souls, the desire for peace and the resilience to overcome difficulties of the war."

Over the last 30 years, IAP has created and conducted dozens of large and small artistic exchange programmes, enabling hundreds of Vietnamese artists and intellectuals to work and visit the US and dozens of American artists and intellectuals to Việt Nam.

Thomas was the first foreigner to be awarded a “For the Culture Cause” order in recognition of his contribution to Việt Nam’s culture in 1999 and an order “For the Cause of Vietnamese Fine Arts” in 2010.

The exhibition also presents artworks from 21 Vietnamese artists who joined exhibitions and artistic exchange programmes organised and funded by IAP for the last 30 years.

They include veteran and established Đặng Xuân Hòa, Bùi Hải Sơn, Đào Châu Hải, Lê Huy Tiếp, Lê Kinh Tài, Phan Cẩm Thượng and Phạm Huy Thông.

Thông is among the youngest Vietnamese artists. His work is a damaged-steel helmet in wartime. Thông remade the helmet and created a flying bird sculpture.

Thông's work helps viewers to feel the soldier's pain in the moment of intersection between life and death and imagine the terrible devastation of war.

Through the art, the artists have built lifelong friendships and become cultural witnesses of three decades of dedication to healing the long war.

The exhibition runs until April 29 at 66 Nguyễn Thái Học Street, Hà Nội. — VNS