A Power from “Hope Exists”

The simple corners that Hung brings are all the scenes that the artist has seen in real life around him. An alley, a yard, a pond, a lawn, a kitchen corner, a staircase, a dining table... nothing strange. Hung sees them from a yard, from a street or from a window, a balcony. Close-up or medium-range view, the scene that appears can be narrow or wide but is not an immense stretch far away. Every tree, every house, every wall, every gate... has Hung's eye stuck there.

Hung’s paintings are realistic, so viewers don’t have to guess what each color block represents and whether the sunlight shadows disappear or not. The simple, cramped and shabby things appear, but at the same time, viewers can see a lightness of poetry hidden in them. Under the light, everything can become more harmonious and lighter than its usual appearance.

Almost all of Hung’s paintings do not depict people (there is only one small painting of a girl standing in the middle of the stairs), this quiet scene is very similar to a forgotten life - when people are busy caring about something else instead of the scene around their lives. The “feeling of absence” is not like when people are away for a while and then return immediately, but it seems like people do not pay much attention to taking care of their daily living space.

The painter passed through these spaces, saw that, did not want to erase that impression; but at the same time, with his tenderness and sensitivity, the painter breathed into that silent atmosphere a warm breath of sunlight, a little relief of clouds. The sunlight did not penetrate deep into the wall to make everything too bright, but it was not a weak, fleeting light either. The sunlight there did not seem to change the nature of things, but led the viewer to drift through the scene of things.

At the same time, something is very closed, something is open. The walls and roofs are closed, but there is always a potted plant, a window, an alley, a pond, a lawn leading the way. The silence, the emptiness, the emptiness at the same time contain a sense of melancholy, evoking a little hope. Maybe that is why the exhibition is called “Hope Exists”.

Hung said that drawing 20 paintings in 3 months was a great achievement for Hung, because normally Hung spent a lot of time thinking both before and during painting. But in this version, the pressure of time gave Hung the determination, so he kept the spirit and strong impression that Hung wanted to convey through the paintings. Playing the role of a painter instead of both the painter and the viewer, in the depths of "Hope Exists" there are dark, heavy emotions that Hung has experienced. But what Hung wants is not to be dominated by those emotions while expressing, Hung wants to look at it more calmly.

Hung is aware that not having the need to paint to make the painting more attractive can make it boring, but Hung is more interested in the use of visual language, the system of shapes, blocks, light, dark, light than in the story or the subject being talked about. Hung approaches reality by being impressed with the structure, shapes, abstract blocks before looking at specific images and details. Then comes the process of filtering, transforming, so that finally the reality of the painting appears in a simplified way in terms of images but still true to the emotions and true to the artist's own aesthetics.

Easel painting today is no longer limited to any trend or school, many artists think that they have no need to paint realistically. For Hung, up to now, this style of painting is still suitable because it requires "you to have life experience and urges you to engage in life to explore and enrich your life experience".

After a period of doing manual labor that had little to do with drawing, Hung realized that “when I did completely different things, every part of me that I loved died.” Finally, Hung realized that “drawing the pictures I like is not just a selfish hobby, but it is how I exist, I want to exist like that and it integrates into my life.”

So even though he was only painting very simple and deprived scenes, he was still able to maintain a calm and affectionate feeling, with Hung - the feeling was very similar to the workers he met, that to survive day by day with them "it also takes a lot of strength". Hung used that strength to paint his "Existing Hope" paintings, for himself and for everyone.