Hanoi Wall Art

Mustard-yellow facades strung with small red flags, the rust-orange girders of Long Bien Bridge and the red pillars of a temple hall fill these Hanoi paintings. Streets and the iron bridge take up much of the range, all in loose, textured brushwork.

Old Quarter streets in yellow, red and green

The street scenes rest on a few strong colours. One work crosses a faded yellow facade with strings of small red flags, while a cyclo and motorbikes wait along the shopfronts below. Another paints a peeling mustard wall, a pale shuttered door and small green stools on the pavement. On a narrow street in a third, a cyclo under a red fringed canopy sits in front of bamboo poles and wooden ladders, with balconies in ochre, green and red. The yellow and red sit well on a pale wall.

Long Bien Bridge in rust and mist

The bridge takes several forms. One painting leads along a railway track to a rust-orange steel bridge, with tangled cables and pink flowers in pots beside it. In another, rust-orange steel frames repeat down the track and fade into pale mist, with a small figure far along the rails. A third shows a boat on the river beneath the steel bridge. The bridge views, which also hang in Bridges, set rust against pale grey or peach skies, and the street and gate views sit alongside the works in Landmarks & Architecture. That orange-brown steel suits a neutral wall.

Autumn avenues, temples and lacquer work

Autumn paintings run orange and gold trees over a street toward an old gate, with motorbikes and cars passing below. Indoors, bronze burners crowd with glowing incense while blue-white smoke curls past red pillars into a dim temple hall. A red pavilion with two orange-tiled roofs rises on carved grey pillars against a blue sky. In a shelved studio, two women work on a black and gold folding screen and a red table. Between the iron girders of one bridge view, a figure wears a yellow ao dai and conical hat; in another painting, a figure in a red ao dai rests by dark wooden doors and round pillars.