The Secret Gardens

I had a few minutes to spare before a shoot yesterday evening, so I took a short drive on some side roads near the Red River. It didn’t take long until I came across fields upon fields of the kinds of trees that are sold all over the streets of the capital during Tet, or the Lunar New Year. I wish I knew their names. They have long thin branches that sprout upwards with small pink red crepe blossoms. A girl working in one of the fields told me that it was best for them to have a lot of buds but not many sprouts. I guess it’s luckiest if they produce their flowers once they’re brought home.

Lunar New Year in Vietnam

Everyone’s always talking about how Hanoi shuts down during Tet, the Lunar New year, but the insane build up to that special little day gets a lot less press. The streets fill with cars and motorbikes and even the sidewalks turn into makeshift lanes during rush hours. Families flood in from the countrysides. People carry clementine trees on the backs of their bikes and goldfish, paper money and other lucky votive symbols are sold at markets throughout the capital. It’s difficult to walk a single block without seeing Chuc Mung Nam Moi (Happy New Year) hanging from some shop window or doorway. It’s always a bit hectic here, but the last few days before the lunar calendar turns over truly take the cake. The storm before the calm, if you will.

I’ve been pretty busy lately, and will be leaving for Singapore in a week, but it still felt good to take a walk around and do some shooting for myself. I’m hoping to get out again tomorrow and the next day, between other meetings and assignments. We’ll see. Here’s to the Year of the Tiger. And whatever auspiciousness it brings along with it.

Three (More) Cheers for Ken Stringfellow

This guy has been making the Vietnam blogging rounds, with posts from photographers Aidan B Dockery and Quinn Ryan Mattingly, but he certainly deserves at least a little more modest praise for his capital efforts this past weekend in Hanoi. It was a great show, and one that I nearly missed. So thanks to CAMA and everyone else who had a hand in the evening. Good work all around.

Three Easy Photographs

Just a few more test shots from one of Hanoi’s New Urban Areas. Basically glorified and scarier pre-suburbs, but with larger buildings and wider roads and a lot less people. These places offer a stark contrast to the general chaos of the capital. I’ll be working on a more long-term project in these areas for the next few months, hopefully employing some new techniques and going back to some old equipment in the process. We’ll see how that all turns out soon enough. There are a lot of things I need to find here in order for this to come out the way I’m envisioning.

Hanoi’s New Urban Landscapes

I’m starting work on something of a large and sprawling personal project, dealing with some of the capital’s new urban areas and its rapid outward expansion and full-throttle thrust into the global economy. One of the nice things about starting on a body of work this loose and disorganized is that I can kind of play around with different mediums and formats and see what I think will really work for the story, as I begin to narrow it all down.

The shots above are all from some expired black & white film I had lying around, processed at a crappy camera store in the Old Quarter. I like the damaged, dark look they’ve taken on, but next time I’ll try to keep a bit more control over the final product. I can always mess them up more, but I can’t take back some of the things the camera store screwed up on. Regardless, it feels good to be shooting film again. It’s hardly ever practical for assignments, so I’m trying to play around with it more for my personal work. I’m not sure what I think of these images in the long term, but they offer an interesting perspective for now.