Nguyễn Thanh Châu (4 January 1939-20 April 2012) was a Vietnamese war artist whose career documented the Second Indochina War. He was born in Tịnh Thới village, Cao Lãnh Province (now known as Đồng Tháp Province) in the

Mekong Delta The Mekong Delta ( vi, Đồng bằng Sông Cửu Long, lit=Nine Dragon River Delta or simply vi, Đồng Bằng Sông Mê Kông, lit=Mekong River Delta, label=none), also known as the Western Region ( vi, Miền Tây, links=no) or South-weste ...

. He joined the Việt Minh in 1953 to fight in the Anti-colonial Resistance War against the French. After the end of the First Indochina War he moved north with his family to Hanoi and enrolled in the oil painting intermediary course at the Vietnam Fine Arts College under director

Trần Văn Cẩn Trần Văn Cẩn ( Kiến An, now part of Hải Phòng city, 13 August 1910 – 1994) was a Vietnamese painter. Biography Trần Văn Cẩn was a student at the École des Beaux-Arts d'Indochine during the tenure of the French sculptor Évariste ...

from 1956 to 1959. In 1960, he was sent to the Soviet Union to study watercolour painting at the All-Ukrainian Art Institute in

Kiev Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

, which provided the basic skills behind much of his future work. After Kiev, he studied in Moscow with his contemporary Lê Lam, before returning to Vietnam in 1964. He joined the

People's Army of Vietnam The People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN; vi, Quân đội nhân dân Việt Nam, QĐNDVN), also recognized as the Vietnam People's Army (VPA) or the Vietnamese Army (), is the military force of the Vietnam, Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the ...

(PAVN) in 1966. After a nine month journey down the Ho Chi Minh Trail, through Laos and Cambodia, Châu arrived in the south, in Tây Ninh Province. He spent most of the remaining years of the war in the area of the Mekong Delta's

Plain of Reeds Plain of Reeds (in vi, Đồng Tháp Mười) is an inland wetland in Vietnam's Mekong Delta. Most of the wetlands are within Long An Province and Đồng Tháp Province. Physical characteristics Đồng Tháp Mười is a "back swamp" forming ...

(Đồng Tháp Mười). He familiarised himself with speed sketching while on the move, which he then developed with watercolours once he returned to the resistance military base in Tây Ninh. He witnessed battles in places such as on the Tiền River, on Black Virgin Mountain (Núi Bà Đen) and near the tunnels of Củ Chi before his advance with the army on its final assault on

Saigon , population_density_km2 = 4,292 , population_density_metro_km2 = 697.2 , population_demonym = Saigonese , blank_name = GRP (Nominal) , blank_info = 2019 , blank1_name = – Total , blank1_ ...

in April 1975. After the war, he held positions as Deputy Secretary General of the Vietnam Fine Arts Association and Secretary General of the Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts Association before retiring to a quiet riverside village suburb in Ho Chi Minh City.

Collections

Vietnam Fine Arts MuseumHo Chi Minh City Fine Arts MuseumWitness Collection

Awards

* First prize at the National Fine Arts Exhibition, 1976 * First prize at the National Fine Arts Exhibition, 1980 * Second Prize at the National Fine Arts Exhibition, 1980 * Second Prize at the National Fine Arts Exhibition, 1990 * First Prize Ho Chi Minh City Fine Arts Exhibition, 1990 * Medal for Fine Arts Career * First Rank Labour Medal

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nguyen, Thanh Chau Vietnamese political people Vietnamese military personnel 1939 births Vietnamese artists 2012 deaths Culture of Russia Soviet artists