In the exhibition On Set, artist Vu Thuy Mai brings together the traditional craft of Vietnamese silk painting with a distinctly contemporary artistic language, creating visual narratives infused with delicacy and poetic sensibility. Her works often unfold through close-up perspectives—ornamental details of ceramics, the veins of leaves, or the textures of wooden furniture—layered onto the translucent surface of silk. The result is an atmosphere that hovers between figuration and illusion, intimacy and dreamlike suspension.
Vu Thuy Mai
Quiet-Fragile 2, 2024
Watercolor on silk
Twin set, 36h x 19w cm each piece
© Courtesy of the artist and VAC
Born in 1990, Vu Thuy Mai graduated from the University of Fine Arts Education, Vietnam (2012), and later earned a Master’s degree in Cultural Studies from the Vietnam National University (2014). Specializing in silk painting, she is particularly known for her use of the dry-brush technique, which produces vibrant tonal layers, allowing color to oscillate between soft gradients and sharp boundaries. This method resonates with traditional Eastern aesthetics, while simultaneously expanding into a contemporary visual terrain.
Her compositions often juxtapose local flora with ceramics and furniture from Vietnam’s dynasties—Ly, Tran, and Nguyen—interweaving historical symbols with motifs from daily life. On silk, these vessels and plants seem to emit their own glow: they carry the aura of history while taking on a staged, almost theatrical presence. In this way, her work does not merely continue tradition but also reinterprets “Orientalism” from within: the depicted objects are no longer passive exotic signs but active voices of cultural self-expression.
Installation view of On Set, August 2, 2025 - Sept 14, 2025, Nan Ke Gallery, Shanghai © Courtesy of Nan Ke Gallery.
Over the past years, Vu Thuy Mai’s works have been featured in major exhibitions and institutions, including the Vietnam National Fine Arts Exhibition, Hanoi Fine Arts Exhibition, the international exhibition series “Art & Fashion D’Nation” (Cambodia, Vietnam, Taiwan), and “Flowers, Shadows, and Ao Dai” in Shenzhen. In 2025, she will take part in an important exhibition at the Temple of Literature–Imperial Academy in Hanoi. Highly regarded within Vietnam’s collecting circles, her works are also increasingly entering international collections.
For Vu Thuy Mai, painting is a meditative journey toward inner stillness. The meticulous gestures of silk painting—delicate, layer by layer—grant her both tranquility and a slower, more reflective perception of life. Through this almost sculptural process, she weaves together culture, history, and personal sensibility, giving rise to an aesthetic experience that feels both intimate and timeless.
Installation view of On Set, August 2, 2025 - Sept 14, 2025, Nan Ke Gallery, Shanghai ©Courtesy of Nan Ke Gallery.
Within On Set, Vu Thuy Mai’s silk paintings unfold like crystallized visions: luminous colors intermingle with the translucency of silk, while ancient objects and natural motifs co-exist in subtle temporal dislocations. They echo the distant past yet resonate as renewed embodiments of Eastern aesthetics in the present. Through this unique visual structure, she invites the viewer to reconsider how tradition is seen, reconstructed, and sustained as a vital foundation of contemporary cultural identity.
August 22, 2025
