By Elisabeth Rosen, The Diplomat
A new arts complex in Hanoi reveals a generational shift.
Vietnam comes of age
When artists wanted to paint in 1980s Vietnam, they had to submit a sketch to the authorities. If it was approved, they got three tubes of paint: two red, one blue.
By the time Nguyen Qui Duc returned to Hanoi in 1989 from more than a decade in the U.S., those times seemed to be over. The Vietnamese government had recently introduced the Doi Moi (“Renovation”) policy and the strict state-controlled economy was slowly loosening up. “There was an openness,” the cultural entrepreneur tells me. “Writers were able to write about the war and the circumstances of society. People were talking about the bonds that tie artists together.”
Still, despite these major social shifts, the arts scene remained nascent and underground. Even with the introduction of the Internet in the early 2000s, which opened up the country to global trends, Vietnam itself lacked cultural innovation.
Until this year, when several artists and creative entrepreneurs, led by Duc and interior designer Tran Vu Hai, turned a Soviet-era pharmaceutical factory in Hanoi into an arts complex. Like Beijing’s 798 Arts District, the industrial setting provides a space for experimental galleries, cafes and bars. It’s also the first signal that Vietnam is moving away from the blatant consumerism that characterized the years since Doi Moi towards a more internationally aware “post-materialist” culture.
“There were so many people looking for a place like this,” says Hai, who owns Bar Betta Republic, one of the first venues to open in the complex along with Duc’s bar and creative space Tadioto. “Before Zone 9, all the different arts spaces were spread around the city. Now this zone has become a center for art — and as a byproduct of that, it’s also become an entertainment center.”
Hai had been looking for “a big old factory” for several years when he found this complex. At the time, it was being used for storage. But when the owners moved away, he, Duc and other cultural entrepreneurs secured rights to the space. Within a matter of months, they transformed the derelict factory complex into what local arts and culture blog Hanoi Grapevine has called “one of the hottest spots in town.”
Read the full article by Elisabeth Rosen from the Diplomat.
