Yui Nguyen
Academic Artist
10
Years in Practice
They stood so we can walk
Medium:
Watercolor
Size:
20 x 30 cm
7.9 × 11.8 in
Year:
2024
Grouped silhouettes rise from a field of ochre and rust, their bodies softened into vertical drifts of light and shadow. Backlighting flattens depth and fuses figure with ground, while scraped highlights and warm washes turn the surface into a single radiant plane. Gold toned passages recall the art historical use of gold to signify sacred presence and transcendent light, especially in Byzantine icons and mosaics, which used luminous grounds to lift human figures into a spiritual register.
The title frames the image as an homage to those who came before. It echoes the long standing metaphor of progress built on predecessors, most famously phrased by Isaac Newton as “standing on the shoulders of giants.” Warm colors dominate, and their psychology reinforces the theme: reds, oranges, and yellows tend to read as energetic and vital, pushing forward with heat and resolve.
Nguyen edits forms to essentials, then lets cadence and temperature carry feeling. One motif anchors the frame, atmosphere does the rest.
about the artist
Yui Nguyen is a writer and visual artist in Ho Chi Minh City. He contributes cultural pieces to Vietcetera, where his work connects everyday life to design, language, and craft, in a clear, conversational voice. In the studio he moves between painting, calligraphy, and language experiments. He co-leads Our Vietnamese Project with Pham Phan Nhan, a research practice that treats Vietnamese as a living system inside computational art.
In 2025 the project was named a Lumen Prize Literature and Poetry Award finalist. The shortlist credits Nhan Phan and Yui Nguyen for work that probes the monosyllabic structure of Vietnamese through custom tools and poetics.