He is the only portrait artist in Quy Nhon at the moment. Technological advances make his career become out of date but he believes in the non-replaceable value of hand drawn portraits. He is Tran Minh Duc, owner of a painting shop in Quy Nhon.
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Duc is drawing a portrait
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Five years ago, I accidentally found a black-and-white photo of my parents taken after their wedding. In the photo, my father wears big dark glasses. I, thus, came to see him to ask him to draw another portrait of my parents basing the photo and my father has no glasses in the new portrait.
I first expressed my worry about the difficulty but he said, “It’s very simple. You bring me some of your father’s photos in which he wears no glasses and I could draw the similar portrait.”
My story is only one of thousands of portraits Duc has drawn in the past 30 years. With only some brush pens, a small eraser, black ink powder, and an easel he has deftly and skillfully captured the mood and the spirits of the subjects in his drawings.
A woman once brought him a photo of her husband but some parts of the photo were worm-eaten. Duc tried any possible measures to re-draw a portrait of her husband basing the photo. The woman sometimes came to his shop to help him “correct” the portrait. When it was finished, she happily cried, “This is truly my husband’s face.”
Graduating in painting from HCM City of Fine Arts, Duc continued to study the portrait art for years and he then returned to Quy Nhon to open a painting shop in 1985.
With the development of many computer-based photo-editing softwares, many talented portrait artists had to stop drawing and find other jobs; meanwhile, Duc has still been attached to his work as a portrait artist.
At present, he is also teaching many students who want to learn drawing. Being a teacher in the past 10 years, he is able to earn more money to continue his work. His two daughters also show their talent for painting.
Anna, a New Zealand health consultant working for Volunteer Service Abroad (VSA) organisation, has recently asked him to draw two portraits of Vietnamese ethnic minority women. She had also asked him to draw other portraits of her family members.
Duc said the portrait art would recover someday as he believes the portraits would win many people’s hearts thanks to their nostalgic beauty and attractive features.
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