Art Embroidered

Born 1948 in Binh Lang village, west of Hanoi, Vietnam. Artist Chien Nguyen began his study of embroidery at the age of 10. He mastered the art of traditional Vietnamese embroidery while working in the clothing embroidery industry for 40 years. The success of his family clothing embroidery business in recent years enabled him to devote more time to his passion of creating beautiful artworks using traditional embroidery techniques. Some of his works are so lifelike that they are mistaken for photographs or paintings. The local government recently designated him as the “artist with golden hands” to recognize his contribution to the development of traditional Vietnamese embroidery.

Like other boys from the countryside, Chien Nguyen grew up helping his parents farm the rice field, raising poultry, and tending buffaloes. Fearing that they won’t be able to keep their eyes on him while they work, his parents sent him to learn traditional Vietnamese embroidery with a local master. For 3 months, he was only given pieces of cloth and a needle with no thread to practice. His teacher wanted him to master the technique of making short and equal stitches required to create good embroideries. For 10 years, he would spend his free time after school making embroideries. Returning home from the army after the war in 1974, he joined an embroidery cooperative in his village. When the cooperative was dissolved in 1984 through economic reforms, he started his own embroidery business.

Today a happy and proud grandfather of 2 grandsons and 3 granddaughters, Mr. Chien Nguyen wishes that his grandchildren would take up his skills to preserve the traditional embroidery technique of Vietnam and bring more Vietnamese embroidery artworks to the world.