Luong Xuan Nhi (Vietnam, 1914-2006)
Rice Fields By The River
signed 'Luong Xuan Nhi' (lower right)
oil on canvas
50 x 64.5 cm. (19 5/8 x 25 5/8 in.)

Price Realised HKD 175,000 at Christie's Hong Kong, 23 November 2014

Rice Fields by the River by first generation Vietnamese painter is a highly representative work showing how Vietnamese modern artists have embraced oil as a medium for creative expression. Nhi's colour palette, seen in this work, is soft and subdued, reflecting a mellowness and subtlety that contemporary viewers have come to associate with modern Vietnamese art in its most developed form.

Luong Xuan Nhi was in fact one of the earliest and most important first generation pioneer artists to advocate that Vietnamese artists trained at the Indochina Fine Arts College, now the Hanoi Fine Arts College, should not just be trained as artisans working with the medium of lacquer and silk, but also western style oil painting in which he excelled.