Mai Van Hien, a key figure of modern Vietnamese art, addressed a handwritten letter in 1998 to Boi Tran Art Gallery on the occasion of its opening. Modest in tone, he offered his wishes while referring to himself with humility. Today, within Boi Tran Garden, the letter stands as an early recognition of a space that would come to connect generations of Vietnamese artists.
Dated 4 May 1996 in Hue, the letter bears the signature of Vinh Phoi (1938–2017). In a few restrained lines, he introduces a young painter and entrusts his evaluation to Boi Tran. There is no rhetoric, only a gesture of trust; a signature whose authority rests not on institutions, but on the life behind it.
It is not merely a recommendation, but a moral guarantee.
Curated by Boi Tran Art Gallery in 1996, this early exhibition marked the emergence of a space rooted in a simple devotion to art and supported by artists across Hue, Hanoi, and Saigon. In his preamble, Nguyen Trung described it as “a poem in form and colour,” a first resonance of a space that would come to connect generations of Vietnamese artists.
Even if small or not, this art gallery is a monument in the city; its appearance will be remembered for ever. Returning to the old city…, to this art gallery, one feels that as he or she is coming back to see a sweetheart, who one will miss and love and never forget for a moment.
Once no art exhibitions have been organized with their actual sense; there would not have been any complete, conventional conformality to the land and her history.
Between the first line and the final signature, nothing was added except time, and time did not transform the drawing; it clarified it. What began as a gesture remained one, neither completed nor concluded, only returned to. The drawing does not preserve a moment. It holds the quiet fact that she was already present before the artist chose to see.
A 1991 publication inscribed by Luu Cong Nhan and gifted to Boi Tran around 1991 reflects a direct and enduring relationship between artists. Within the Boi Tran Collection and Boi Tran Art Gallery, such works form part of artistic connections, where memory and exchange continue to be sustained.
