Vietnamnet global

24/10/2015 07:00 (GMT+07:00)

Art & Entertainment News in Brief

Noted Israeli photographer shows off works in capital, HCM City’s signature souvenirs announced, Charmaine Sheh to strut the runway in HCM City, Cheap rail tours start in HCM City, Davines Hair Show 2015 presents newest hairstyles

Noted Israeli photographer shows off works in capital

The Embassy of Israel in Viet Nam will host the photo exhibition "Writing with Light" by Ziv Koren, one of Israel's most highly regarded photographers.

Fifty black and white photos will portray the existence of light in various forms: the sun, fog, darkness, street lights, and dark alleys. The images feature Koren's perspective of humanitarian subjects and conflicts.

The event "Writing with Light" which shares the same title as his 14th book also focuses on the importance of light as the primary raw material in photography.

The exhibition will open at Exhibition House, 45 Trang Tien Street from October 23rd to November 1st at 9am-12am and 2pm-6pm.

Ho Chi Minh City’s signature souvenirs announced

Handicraft souvenir designs exclusively featuring Ho Chi Minh City were announced as winners of the 2015 Hoa Sen (Lotus) Awards on October 22.

Speaking at the awarding ceremony, Deputy Director of the municipal Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism La Quoc Khanh said that souvenir products in the city’s shops and traditional markets have yet met tourists’ demands and tastes so far.

Therefore, winners of this competition will help introduce and promote the locality’s image rapidly and effectively, he affirmed.

After seven months of launching, the competition attracted the participation of 40 organisations and individuals, including 20 students and one foreigner, with 66 entries.

The Lavanto Home Décor company won the first prize for a collection of products named “Saigon in me” and the third prize for “Saigon at a glance” items, while the second one went to a bag collection of the Hoang Ha Garment Limited Company.-VNA

Six more national relics announced

The Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism has added six more attractions to the list of national relics.

They are Vinh Loc Ha Communal House in Ha Noi, The Pa valley's terraced fields in Lao Cai Province, Hoan Duong Communal House in Ha Nam Province, and Tram Chim National Park in Dong Thap Province, and President Ho Chi Minh Commemorative Area and worship place for Drs Dang Nghiem and Dang Dien in Thai Binh Province.

Cheap rail tours start in HCM City

The Saigon Railway Co. and the HCM City Travel Association (HTA) have joined hands with tourism authorities in Binh Thuan, Khanh Hoa, Phu Yen, and Binh Dinh to offer low-cost rail tours between the southern metro and these four south-central provinces.

Saigon Railway Co. will add a 44-seat coach to existing trains with free wi-fi, food and other facilities.

The tour price will be competitive since the HTA will get discounts from tourism service providers in these places.

HTA has tied up with airlines to offer discounted domestic tour packages for years.

In the first nine months of this year more than 100,000 travellers booked such tours.

Cake festival celebrated in Can Tho

The fifth southern traditional cake festival will be celebrated in the Mekong city of Can Tho from April 15 to 19 next year to also mark Mekong Delta Tourism Week and National Tourism Year.

The festival will seek to introduce visitors to the region's traditional cakes like banh tet, a cylindrical glutinous rice cake filled with green bean paste and pork fat; banh u, a small, pyramidal glutinous rice cake; banh tet la cam, a cylindrical violet glutinous rice cake; banh xeo, a rice pancake with shrimp; and banh bo dua, a coconut-flavoured sponge cake.

The fourth festival, held from April 27 to May 1 this year, saw more than 100 types of cakes and 50 specialty dishes on display, and attracted 160,000 visitors.

Contemporary verse meets traditional in music performance

Modern poems by Nguyen Duy will be used in traditional music to be performed on Saturday in Ha Noi.

Traditional artists such as veteran Xuan Hoach, Thanh Hoai, Minh Gai and Thanh Ngoan will combine the poems with their performing arts.

The artists will rearrange many traditional music genres such as cheo (traditional opera), hat van (ritual singing), ca tru (ceremonial singing), tuong (classical opera) and xam (ancient folk songs performed by blind beggars).

Nguyen Duy is one of the prominent poets of Vietnamese contemporary poetry. His poem Tre Viet Nam (Viet Nam Bamboo) is on textbook for the grade 4.

The poem is among ten others to be performed at the show. The poems were composed by the poet from the 1970s to the 1990s.

"Bamboo tree is a typical tree in Viet Nam. I wrote Viet Nam Bamboo to praise Vietnamese characteristic solidarity, hardworking, brave and beloved," Duy said.

"My poets were performed by the traditional artists before when I was invited to speak at the colleges," he added.

Hoai will recite the first sentences of the poem and Hoach will sing the rest of the poem in the xam style.

"I love the poem. It talks about the image of our country's villages as indispensable silhouettes of trees. At the same time it expresses the beautiful qualities of the people of Viet Nam," Hoai said.

"Nguyen Duy is a poet for all Vietnamese. He represents all Vietnamese who pay tributes to the country and parents. He preserves successfully the sound and timbre of the Vietnamese in his literary works that enable us to perform easily with traditional art genres," she added.

Another poem Nhin Tu Xa To Quoc (See Country From Distant) will be performed as a highlight of the show combining with tuong (classical opera) by People's Artist Minh Gai.

Poet Nguyen Duy will narrate his stories together at the performance.

The performance will begin at 8pm at the French Cultural Centre.

‘Singapore Invites' with photo contest

The Singapore Tourism Board has launched an online photo contest called "Singapore Invites".

Anyone aged at least 18 can invite to Singapore up to three people from any part of the world by uploading a photo that depicts their dream experience in Singapore and saying why this dream experience is meaningful to them within 300 words.

Winners can bring their guests to Singapore for a three-day stay with free accommodation and air travel. A total of 25 winners will be picked.

Entries can be submitted on Instagram with the hashtags of one's country of residence and #SingaporeInvites or through www.yoursingapore.com/singaporeinvites. The contest ends on December 6.

German Business Association to hold dance next month

The German Business Association (GBA) and the German Industry and Commerce will organise a traditional black-tie ballroom dance, the German Ball Saigon 2015, on November 21.

About 380 guests are expected to attend the annual event, which is the largest gathering of high-level personalities of the German and international community in HCM City, their friends and business acquaintances.

The evening will include a champagne reception, classic ballroom dancing, entertainment by two German bands, a gala dinner and a lucky draw.

The German Ball at InterContinental Asiana Saigon also celebrates the 40th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Viet Nam and Germany as well as GBA's 20 years in Viet Nam.

Davines Hair Show 2015 presents newest hairstyles

The 10th Davines Hair Show 2015 (DHS 2015) featuring the latest hairstyle trends will return to HCM City on November 5.

Organised by Davines Viet Nam Co. and Dep magazine, the show "Toi Gin Giu Ve Dep" (I Preserve Beauty) will feature leading designers Hoang Minh Tam and Don Hau and hair designers from Allilon Hair Academy in London.

The show is expected to attract 1,000 participants, including foreign and Vietnamese hair stylists, fashion designers, models and celebrities.

Directed by Viet Tu, the show's theme is "Life is surrounded by beauty. Beauty is everywhere".

Hair designer Hoang Minh Tam will open the show with his collection "Goldess" ("Gold" in combination with "Goddess") with hairstyles favoured in the 1960s and 1980s.

His demonstration will also include a fashion show of Kelly Bui's newest collection called Sherlock Holmes.

Hair designer Don Hau will show his collection called Legend composed of exquisite and splendid hair styles reflecting a garden, with many kinds of flowers in brilliant natural light.

Vietnam heritage photo exhibition opens in Binh Thuan

Some 100 outstanding photos selected in the fourth Vietnam Heritage Photo Awards are on display at a one-week exhibition, which opened in the central coastal city of Phan Thiet, Binh Thuan province, on October 22.

The photos were chosen from 4,740 entries in both single images and photo sets submitted to the fourth Vietnam Heritage Photo Awards organised annually by the Vietnam Heritage Magazine under the Vietnam Cultural Heritage Association.

The exhibition in Binh Thuan is the first in a series to be held across the country from now to the end of this year. The photos will be put on show in a foreign country early next year.

The contest has brought Vietnamese heritage closer to the public, helping popularise a Vietnam of hospitality and beauty among international friends while raising public awareness of promoting and preserving cultural and natural heritages.

On the same day, the organising board presented awards to six photo works on the theme “Binh Thuan Green Convergence”.-VNA

Charmaine Sheh to strut the runway in HCM City

Charmaine Sheh has accepted the invitation of the show’s organizer Ly Nha Ky and will grace the catwalk at the Lynk Fashion Show set to kick off November 11 in Ho Chi Minh City.

“Ky has a very entrepreneurial spirit and is an accomplished actress, model and businesswoman in addition to being the Tourism Ambassador of Vietnam, said Sheh in announcing her acceptance.

“I feel we have many similarities and I am looking forward to meeting with Ky and sharing our life’s experiences both in the business and artistic worlds.”

Sheh said she also has a passion for fashion and will be participating in clothing created by designer Alexis Mabille at the event.

Gia Lai Museum cold-stores never-seen artefacts

Thousands of artefacts collected by the main museum in the Central Highlands province of Gia Lai have never been displayed due to the lack of funds and exhibition space.

Nguyen Thi Kim Van, director of Gia Lai Museum said they had only six display rooms, but because these rooms were small, they were unable to develop thematic displays.

Gia Lai Museum actually stores a rich treasure-trove of 10,000 items in their collection featuring typical cultures in central highlands such as gongs, drums and wood statues. However, only 2,000 items have been put on display.

The museum's employees have tried their best persuade people from donating items instead of allowing them to be sold off to antique hunters. "Now they've just been dumped in storage," an employee said.

Thousands of these objects are beginning to suffer damage due to the lack of proper storage.

According to Van, whenever there is a cultural event, items are brought out for display. But in the long run, there was hope that the museum will eventually be upgraded with an outdoor exhibition area to attract more visitors and display items.

The VND12 billion (USD545,000) Gia Lai Museum opened in 2009 to welcome the International Gong Festival. The museum displays historical items, natural resources, valuable and rare animals and minerals in the province as well as historical artefacts.

Keo Pagoda Autumn Festival kicks off

The 2015 Keo Pagoda Autumn Festival opened in Duy Nhat commune, Vu Thu district, Thai Binh province on October 22, on the tenth day of the ninth lunar month.

The festival aims to commemorate Buddhist monk Duong Khong Lo (1016-1094) and those who took part in the pagoda construction, from the 17th century.

In addition to the traditional religious rituals that commemorate the Buddhist monk, the festival also hosts a variety of cultural activities that reflect the lifestyle of the Red River Delta’s agricultural communities.

Many folk games, such as racing shells, trumpets and drums, a performance of a traditional dance called "frog seize" and preparing phoenix-winged betel quid, are being organising at the festival.

The festival runs until October 27, and is considered an opportunity to showcase the landscapes and people in Thai Binh, and help to promote cultural and socio-economic development.

Just over 130 km from the capital Hanoi, the Keo Pagoda, which was built in 1632, is an ancient building with 128 rooms - more than any other pagoda in Vietnam.

There are two passages which separate the pagoda from the temple. They are designed with curved roofs that join together at the 11.04m-high iron and wood bell tower.

The tower has three storeys, each of which possesses its own tiled roof and bronze bell.

The 58,000 m2 pagoda is home to a wealth of ancient artifacts, which range from intricately engraved wooden dragons to a collection of over 100 statues.

The Keo Pagoda Festival is held annually in the first lunar month and the ninth lunar month.

President Ho’s ‘Prison Diary’ poetry collection unveiled in Albanian

President Ho Chi Minh’s collection of poems entitled ‘Nhat Ky Trong Tu’ (Prison Diary) has been translated into Albanian by Gjeke Marinaj, an Albanian-American writer who is living in the US.

A ceremony was held in Hanoi on October 21 by the Vietnam Writers’ Association (VWA) to introduce the publication to the public.

The publication is the outcome of a conference on advertising Vietnamese literature abroad, hosted by the VWA in March 2015 with an aim to encourage more projects on translating Vietnamese literary work into foreign languages.

Speaking at the event, VWA Chairman, poet Huu Thinh conveyed his thanks to the translator for his effort and significant devotion in translating the Vietnamese work.

He expressed his belief that since poetry has its own way to shorten any distance, the collection would help foreigners understand more about the Vietnamese leader as well as Vietnamese people’s struggle for freedom.

For his part, poet Gjeke Marinaj shared that he has had a love for the Vietnamese land and its people for a long time. He stressed his respect for President Ho Chi Minh as a poet, a leader and a soldier who fought for peace.

He said that this Albanian version of the collection is the result of months of working and referencing other translations of ‘Prison Diary’ in order to produce a full translation of the work.

In its first publication in Albanian, 5,000 copies have been printed and the book has been released in Albania, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia.

He expressed his hope that his translation of the work would help the Albanian-speaking community grasp a deeper understanding of the messages of humanity, solidarity, and peace featured in the book.

‘Prison Diary’ consists of 133 poems written in Chinese Han script from August 29, 1942, to September 10, 1943. It has been translated into 25 languages around the world.