A silk painting by Trần Thị Hội. Images courtesy of the artists and VNUFA

HÀ NỘI — Seven graduates of the Việt Nam University of Fine Arts have been honoured for their artistic excellence at the first-ever Victor Tardieu Awards, which were established and launched this year to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Indochina School of Fine Arts, now the Việt Nam University of Fine Arts (VNUFA).

Awards categories cover a variety of criteria in diverse areas of study and artistic materials, including oil, lacquer and silk painting, graphics, sculpture, graphic design and art pedagogy, or theory, history and criticism.

Jointly organised by VNUFA, Millon Vietnam and the A&V Foundation, the initiative aims to encourage students who achieve great things in their studies and in fine arts, helping provide a stepping stone in the development of their artistic careers in the future.

A lacquer painting by Nguyễn Dương Trà Mi, one of the inaugural Victor Tardieu Award winners.

An awards ceremony was held on Friday at the Việt Nam Fine Arts Museum as part of an exhibition opening for a show themed '100 Modern Fine Arts – Collection of the Việt Nam University of Fine Arts and the Việt Nam Fine Arts Museum'.

The seven students who received the inaugural awards were Tống Tiến Đạt in oil painting, Trần Thị Hội in silk painting, Nguyễn Dương Trà Mi in lacquer painting, Trịnh Thu Vân in graphics, Nguyễn Đức Nghĩa in sculpture, Đinh Thanh Trúc in fine arts pedagogy and Nguyễn Phuong Anh in graphic design.

With their compositions and graduation projects earning high praise from the university and art council as well as the awarding committee, the students have shown their potential in the arts and are worthy representatives of the new generation of artists.

The winners and their graduation projects will be exhibited in Hà Nội and introduced at art centres in Paris, France.

At the ceremony, awards were presented in the presence of Alix Turolla, Victor Tardieu's granddaughter, who is visiting Việt Nam at the invitation of the VNUFA. 

An oil on canvas painting by Tống Tiến Đạt.

Alix Turolla is one of VNUFA's honoured guests, who will also be attending a grant ceremony on November 15 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the university's founding.

Her visit is of special significance as a descendant of the founder of fine arts education in Việt Nam, connecting to the brilliant achievements of a century of development, according to the VNUFA.

The awards are named after Victor Tardieu (1870-1937), a French painter who was also the first principal and founder of the Indochina College of Fine Arts, the predecessor of VNUFA. Tardieu had a great passion for Vietnamese fine arts and contributed to training the first generation of modern fine artists in Việt Nam.

He is also considered the founder of modern Vietnamese fine arts, helping form the first generation of painters in the country.

Speaking at the ceremony on Friday, Deputy Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Tạ Quang Đông highlighted the contributions of the first generations of lecturers at the Indochina School of Fine Arts to Việt Nam's fine arts formation and development.

He said: "Exactly a century ago, the Indochina School of Fine Arts opened its first course, starting a period of strong innovation in our country's fine arts through the absorption of the quintessence of Western plastic arts, combined with the nation's traditional cultural and aesthetic values."

"Teachers such as Victor Tardieu and Évariste Jonchère not only imparted scientific and modern teaching methods, but also inspired love for national art, creative consciousness and Vietnamese identity in each student. From this school, many great names were born, contributing to laying the foundation for the development of modern Vietnamese fine arts," Đông concluded.

Meanwhile, VNUFA Principle Đặng Thị Phong Lan said the Victor Tardieu Awards ceremony is a special event among a series of activities to celebrate the university's 100th anniversary.

"French painter Victor Tardieu was not only the founder of the Indochina School of Fine Arts, but also an art educator with extremely progressive ideas. 

"On one hand, he had imparted scientific knowledge of Western plastic arts, while on the other hand, he always encouraged Vietnamese students and promote their creative personality, research capacity, learning, innovation and development of traditional Vietnamese aesthetic and technical values, promoting the cause of creating an independent and unique Vietnamese fine arts in the flow of the times," Lan said.

The Victor Tardieu Award honours the personal contribution of the founding principal of the school and also represents a prestigious award for VNUFA graduates and their artwork, with a spirit of humanistic creativity, rich in cultural identity and development potential, according to the principal.

In June, the VNUFA, Millon and the A&V Foundation signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly organise the Victor Tardieu Awards, while also strengthening cooperation in the field of art, supporting the development of fine arts in Việt Nam and connecting with the global fine arts community. VNS