VietNamNet Bridge – Two paintings by the late Vietnamese artist Nguyen Huyen have been sold at a Hong Kong auction for almost US$22,000.

Under the hammer: Portrait of an Old Vietnamese Gentlemen by Nguyen Huyen.

The artwork went under the hammer yesterday at Sotheby’s Hong Kong auction house.

Huyen’s Portrait of an Old Vietnamese Gentlemen, lot 304, dated 1952 and painted with charcoal and red chalk on paper, sold for $2,800 but it was his second piece that fetched the most money.

Nue De Mademoiselle Hai Duong (Miss Hai Duong’s Nude), lot 301, dated 1937, and painted with ink and gouache on silk laid on paper, was sold for $19.100.

This confirms the large range of influence the Vietnamese art market has around the world, especially in Hong Kong.

The decision of auctioning off Huyen’s artworks was made by Sotheby’s after many of his paintings were displayed and sold at an exhibition at Vietnamese Chon’s Auction House.

Hoang Ngoc Hung, head of Chon’s Auction House, said the late painter’s Dang Ngoc (Natural Beauty), a rare nude lacquer painting, dating back to 1967, previously displayed at the house’s 9th auction, was sold for $45,000, out pricing other lots at the exhibition.  

“However, we should only see it as a nice surprise, as we need more paintings to be set for auction to end up finding a reasonable average price for Nguyen Huyen’s artwork,” said Hung.

He added on the last week of April, Chon’s will select half of the painter’s works, kept by eight collectors to go to auction, including The Portrait of Vietnamese Women (painted in 1938, priced at $600), The Portrait of Mademoiselle Van (dated 1940, priced initially at $700), Seeking a Friend (dated 1944, priced at $1,000), The Bo Market (dated 1961, priced at $600).

Huyen was born in the northern province of Bac Ninh in 1915 and died in 1994.

Source: VNS