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Abha is a contemporary Indian artist, living in Vietnam for more than a decade. She is a self-taught artist and her only influence in art has been her German art teacher in high school at the University of Cambridge, where her confidence in strokes and use of colors were embedded early and she continues to paint in various mediums. She has spent most of her early life in the foothills of the Himalayan mountains with her parents. Though the remoteness and distance from big cities curtailed her in interacting with other artists and galleries, she kept her creativity alive by commissioned artworks, which she still continues to do for private art collectors worldwide.
This sketch painting is of two Vietnamese women rushing by boat to catch buyers in the early morning market. Many Vietnamese village women cross the river along the backwaters in small boats to bring their farm produce to sell every morning to local markets. I sketched these two women in pencil as they used their oars to cross the river. Later in my studio I redid the drawing with ink and watercolor, showing the water flow and the thick foliage in the background.
In a traditional marketplace in Saigon, I saw a group of Vietnamese women getting ready to sell their farm produce. These markets are active for only a few early morning hours. There is a great camaraderie among these sellers, and they support each other. I sketched this group of women sellers in pencil, and later in my studio I redid the drawing in ink pen and watercolor. I feel I captured the mood.
This artwork was done during the Covid-19 pandemic. As I saw from my window, not many people were out on the streets of Saigon, but this elderly coconut seller seemed determined to find stray buyers as he trudged slowly under the weight of his shoulder-basket along the pavement. The image stayed well in my mind, and I made many sketches before I did this final artwork in one sitting. The initial drawing on the blank canvas was done by a black marker pen. After that I used very diluted oil paint to paint the shades on the figure in several layers. The green shade was important to show the scruffiness of the old clothes the vendor was wearing. The rest of the colors were influenced by the hues of the setting sun, while the focus remained on the heavy weight the man was carrying.
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