With our series “An artist´s life.” we want to share the stories of the people behind the art.
“An artist´s life.”
The stories of the people behind the art
My Hanh Bui (B.M.H) #14
“I’m a 21 Vietnamese girl and I’m currently living in Hanoi – the capital of Vietnam. I was born in 1998 and in a family where nobody loves art. I used to feel ashamed of being an art-lover because my whole family doesn´t care about it and they want me to do something which brings a lot of money, and they believe that money is the only thing that can bring happiness.
When I was 8-10 years old, I suffered from moderate depression for the first time in my life. Then the depression continued to follow me until early 2019. Until then, I found the answer to this depression when I found BTS’s music (BTS is a boyband group from South Korea).
“I used to feel ashamed of being an art-lover because my whole family doesn´t care about it and they want me to do something which brings a lot of money.”
I feel so lucky because thanks to the art of BTS, I have learned how to accept myself – an art-lover, how to forgive myself and how to love myself as much as possible. Moreover, through BTS, I have learned to never give up and to reach out for my dream – the dream to go against the perspective of my whole family.
I have taught myself photography. Portrait photography is the subject that I care about the most, because I love seeing the emotions of people around me through the lens. I have been inspired about portrait photography by many things: movies, photos, music, books, artistic perspectives of people around me and so on. One day, I watched a movie called The Greatest Showman, and at the end of this movie, there’s a quote that has impressed me: “The noblest art is about making others happy.” After thinking a lot about that quote and the lesson about the life & youth of BTS, I decided to take photos from the people around me, of my best friends and other friends. Because, I truly believe that, we all have the galaxy in our hearts, and we all have a unique beauty.
“I want to use portrait photography to help people around me to be able to love and appreciate themselves more.”
For me, I just want to use portrait photography to help people around me to be able to love and appreciate themselves more. And of course, we only bring happiness to others when we’re truly happy, right? Right at this present moment, I’m truly happy with myself (after 15 years alone fighting with depression), so I would love to make other people feel happy like me and love themselves more. I don’t know about my future, but I’m sure that will be the mission of my pursuit of portrait photography.
The girl in this series is my nearly 15 years friend. She, like me, also suffered from psychological disorders as well as depression, and yes, she is an art-lover, too. The space in the series is a small room with orange and blue curtains. I’m not sure if she will love herself more after looking at these pictures, but I’m sure the emotions she shows in these pictures are true to her person. And that makes me very happy because she can be herself without having to wear a mask. I always hope, not only her, but all the people I captured and will capture in the future will always feel truly happy with themselves.”
