Ethnic Southeast Asian faces are focus of Laval exhibition
Update: Jun 06, 2011
A photo exhibition called ‘Faces of Asian Ethnic Groups’ from famous French artist Sebastien Laval will open at the New Space Arts Foundation in Hue City on Sunday, June 5th 2011.

The black and white photos portray the life and culture of people in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue, Cambodia’s Angkor Wat and Luang Prabang in Laos.

 

Laval captures floating houses, flickering fires, the innocent smiles of kids, the austere expression of an ethnic man, or a tobacco pipe between a woman’s lips.

 

Some photos are portraits depicting both traditional customs and changes in people’s lives from traditional clothes to satellite dishes, food, old roofs and asphalt roads; reflecting the changes in the lives of the ethnic people. The images have no titles, allowing viewers to feel and discover the characters without instruction and to try to feel them, talk to them, look at them and understand the ethnic people.

 

Talking about one particular photo, Laval Sebastien said: “One morning, I came to a Laos village and met a young girl carrying her brother in front of her house. By the afternoon, she had become acquainted with me, and I captured a photo of her sitting on sand with a radiant smile. I realized then that people still acknowledge and have a mutual understanding even if they don’t use the same language.”

 

Laval started in the business in 1993 and is living in Poitiers in his native France. Earlier this year, he had an exhibition ‘Communities throughout time’ in Hanoi.

 

The exhibition on the second floor, 15 Le Loi Street, Hue runs until July 5.

SGT