VietNamNet Bridge – Bridget March, an English artist, has nurtured a deep love for Vietnam after about four years living and working here, not because of the country’s development or its landscapes. Rather, she finds Vietnam’s culture and heritages as more valuable, and has gone great lengths to promote such merits to foreign tourists and locals by introducing her books and exhibitions across the country.

Bridget March shows her sketches and watercolor artworks.

In an interview with the Daily, Bridget March shares her concern about the identity of HCMC and the disappearance of many heritage buildings in the city.

“How can people know who you are and what you are, and how can you get people to understand you if you don’t have any photographs of your family or memory of your days to school, or your time of being soldier, a teacher, or a nurse, and your traveling. You are nobody, absolutely nobody. If you do the same to the city or if you knock down all of its history, it becomes faceless,” says the artist enthusiastically.

The artist stresses the importance of preserving heritages to help promote local tourism.

“I think that those heritages have to be preserved to the sanity and the hearts of future generations. And also, heritages are what tourists adore. Western tourists are all looking for the history of a place.

“They love to go to Singapore where they are all going to stay in a modern city that was built on a reclaimed land with flashy hotels. But, they don’t stay there during the day, they go down to the old buildings as they love the vibration that comes out from the walls of all such buildings and they feel like they really experience it - that’s history.”

According to Bridget March, “it’s not an interesting city if tourists just eat some meals or join a taxi drive if they don’t really understand the people who live there. And if you take all of these away it will be not an interest to the tourists,” she adds.

The artist shows her happiness to witness many young people showing their care to and interest in the old building at 42 Nguyen Hue Boulevard on the pedestrian square. Bridget March recalls how those young people went there to set up their own businesses of coffee shops, fashion stores and studios and helped infuse a fresh spirit into the old construction. People all knew that the building would be demolished in the near future and these young people would grow up with only memory about the place and their children and grandchildren would have no chance to know about it, she explains.

Bridget March is planning on her third book - a 120 page paperback about Saigon called Sensational Saigon. As Saigon is always changing so it has taken the artist over two years to get this book together but now “I am confident I have put my finger on the pulse of this city.”

The book includes many stories and some legends about Saigon and it is illustrated with over 100 drawings and watercolor paintings of the old and the new, the familiar and the hidden. To her, Saigon will always continue to change but she has taken a ‘snapshot’ of this vibrant place while it is in its most dynamic moment of change.

March is confident that the book with interesting information will help visitors and locals alike seeing the details of the city’s fabric and to understand its culture better.

“I love Saigon and I hope that this book will help others to appreciate its unique layers of history from the oldest temples and graceful villas, through decades of change to the modern skyline that is becoming its new signature.”

March is currently seeking a publishing partner to help publish and distribute her books at bookstores and hotels nationwide so she can sell more books to interested people and to continue creating new titles.

March also shares her upcoming plan is to join the Culin’ Art exhibition of InterContinental Nha Trang in the central coast city of Nha Trang mid January, 2017.

A sketch depicting an old building at 42 Nguyen Hue Boulevard on the pedestrian square.     A map of some iconic places in city downtown.               A painting made from acrylic and gold leaf featuring an old building in Cho Lon.

SGT

Kieu Giang