At the WeChoice Awards ceremony on the evening of January 12, Tran Thanh attended as a guest artist to announce the awards.
The male MC talked about the guests wearing Ao Dai to the event: "This is the first time at the awards ceremony we are proud to wear national costumes to the event. Looking closely at our national costumes, they are very fashionable. Everyone looks at each other and sees what they are wearing, whether it is beautiful or not, that is something I am extremely proud of."
Tran Thanh's statement was immediately shared widely on social networks, receiving many controversial opinions.
The story of proposing the ao dai as a ceremonial dress and national dress has received mixed opinions over the years. Therefore, Tran Thanh calling the ao dai a national dress is incorrect.
The audience thinks that Tran Thanh's sharing of inaccurate information is a lack of research and disrespect for the audience, because Vietnam does not have an official national costume, while the guest designs include innovative designs with a modern style.
"Without doing thorough research, you're already shouting and calling names randomly. Does Tran Thanh really understand the national costume?", "Many people attending this event wore ao dai but they transformed it too much, revealing, not like ao dai at all?", "There are many events where artists wear ao dai, there's no need to exclaim like that"... - the audience commented.
In a conversation with Lao Dong reporter, artist Nguyen Duc Binh - Head of the Center for Supporting the Development of Traditional Vietnamese Village Ao Dai - said that the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism had made a National Costume Project but left it unfinished.
By 2012, this project was changed to the State Costume Project to find a set of costumes for civil servants and state officials to wear to perform ceremonies, especially diplomatic ceremonies.
"The national costume must be a cultural symbol, there needs to be a legal framework regulating the selection criteria, standards, usage regulations, and regulations on which level is approved for recognition," the artist shared.
