When coming to visit the street household team No. 28, in Dich Vong Hau ward, Cau Giay district, one can not help but be surprised at the unique works, that is a nearly 200 metre–long pottery painting wall, containing dozens of pictures with aesthetics, fine arts and education values for the young generation.
Pottery painting alley helps creating a healthy living space for locals
The alley No. 78, once a piece of land belonging to the production and business-doing facilities of the invalids, is now converted into the residential area. The alley has been covered a “new dress”, adding more beauties to houses. However, not many know that the road was uneven, difficult to walk, with no drainage system, lamp-posts standing in its way, so it caused lots of inconvenience to the households when going in and out, especially during rainy seasons. Formerly, as a retired worker of national defence, being taking part in the ward’s activities, given that situation, Mrs. Vu Thi Bac, Deputy Chairwoman of the Fatherland Forefront Committee of the Ward Dich Vong Hau, pioneered in making concrete and digging a drain-ditch for the alley section in front of her home and then encouraging others to follow suit. After the alley had been concreted, she once again went on with the propaganda, mobilizing other households to make funding contributions. And then, she actively started to clear relevant prodedures for the moving of the lamp-posts close to the foot of the walls for easier movement.
The alley and its suroundings were clean, good-looking and neat, but whenever passing by, she still felt uneasily about “wall garbages” situation. The wall of the Basic Secondary School runs along the front of the households which was tainted by serried pieces of paper, printed with telephone numbers for services advertisement, looks unbeautiful. To cope with it, the households had been trying hard to clean up and erase them, but just in a few days things started to reoccur. Having considered it, she decided to hire labourers to make a pottery painting in front of her house to prevent the “epidemic” of small ads. The reason she selected the pottery material was that is traditional material, not only fine but durable and adaptable to climate conditions. When water is absorbed, the painting becomes colorfully brighter, extremely impressive. Upon completion of her painting, all of her neighbours came and praised it, promting her thinking of further urging the households in the street team to do the same. Ackowledging the act of beautification of the alley and houses, all households responded postively to participate in it. The content of paintings had been also discussed and agreed, focusing on familiar landscapes of rural areas i.e banian tree, river wharf and communal house’s court; daily activities of farmers such as rice planting, water delivery, the northern delta’s rural life. Each household was allowed to choose a theme for their own home, but as for consistency all had to use the same colour, that would help make the wall more beautiful. The wall was split into two parts, the upper was decorated by the selected topics, while the lower (nearly 1 metre high) was uniformly painted with lotus flowers, this is the icon of Viet Nam, depicting the bravery, spirits and beauty of the Vietnamese people. Exclusively at the wall’s two ends, she and her neighbours had chosen the paintings of “Khue Van Cac symbol in Van Mieu-Quoc Tu giam Literature Temple” and “return home to pay gratitude to ancestors upon receiving academic honours”, with a view to reminding everyone of the Hanoians’ prides, of Thang Long – Ha Noi of thousand year culture, encouraging young generations to try their best in study so as to become useful citizens.
Mrs. Vu Thi Bac, “who gives birth” to pottery paintings alley
With her sense of creativeness and enterprise, together with the concensus and strong support for the good by other households, the Street Team No. 28 has come up with a unique art work. The pottery painting wall has changed the facade of the Street Team No. 28, creating a green-clean-beautiful living setting to the households, raising the awareness of environmental protection, becoming a flagship in the implementation of urban cilvilized and orderly year, further making the landscapes of the Ha Noi Capital much more beautiful. All of this have been highly appreciated by the leaders of Dich Vong Hau ward, Cau Giay district. Other than that, the subtle and sharp art paintings have born a great significance in educating young generations living within the street household team to honour the aesthetical values and to understand more about the Vietnamese countrysides in particular and the country – people of Viet Nam in general.
Minh Hue