Simplicity, nostalgia and compassion run in equal measure through the works of Le Thiet Cuong, one of Vietnam’s pioneering and celebrated contemporary painters.

An outstanding representative of minimalism, he is admired both in Asia and elsewhere.

He has exhibited around the globe, including in Singapore, Korea, Switzerland, Italy, Belgium, France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US

His works are not sparkling or colorful, but gentle, surprisingly simple and almost without color.

One of Le Thiet Cuong’s works at the Chuyen cua Lan exhibition in Hanoi

The artist once said, almost immodestly, that nothing can be added to or taken away from his paintings.

He set the record straight when he said he considered his works “not important at all – [they] only feature subjects standing, sitting, resting or walking”.

Art critic Phan Cam Thuong says Cuong’s works, simple as they seem, convey profound meanings beneath a veil of simplicity.

The artist himself has said, “I can sense beauty in the dark yellow of rice, in the white of lingering rain, the opaque of the cold weather and the dull and gloomy color of the early morning or late afternoon.”

“Life is not always made up of blue sky, white clouds or radiant sunshine.”

His subject matters mostly center on people’s everyday life - like herding buffaloes, skipping, playing chess or moon watching - like in “Contemplating lotuses,” “A couple” and “Sunset.”

A wistfulness for the past permeates most of Cuong’s works.

His latest exhibition, Chuyen cua Lan (Lan’s story), which is on at Thanh Binh Gallery, 25-27 Trang Tien, Hanoi, from April 14 to May 14, is an assemblage of 24 nostalgic oil on canvas works.

For the first time, the artist tells a story about a girl named Lan with his brush.

“Lan’s story” is also a reminder of the harsh times of wars and hardship.

“I paint mostly from my reminiscences and experiences.

“I usually paint a person I meet, a scene I saw or a thing I used, as past things can arouse emotions more easily than new ones.

“I can’t paint today’s youths who have their hair dyed, chat and write their blogs on the Internet.

“A painting is not a creation of the hands but of the mind. Perhaps, I start to return to a point which I did not belong to from the beginning.”

Cuong, born in 1962 in Hanoi into a family of artists, belongs to a generation that has witnessed enormous changes.

In 1985 after serving in the army as a cartographer and working as a farm hand, he enrolled in set design and animation at the Vietnamese Film College.

He graduated in 1990 before studying Tay Tang (Tibet), a Vietnamese version of the Tibetan Buddhist practice of Dzogchen.

Buddhist philosophy and the I Ching, called “Book of Changes,” a system of cosmology and philosophy intrinsic to ancient Chinese cultural beliefs, have been major influences on his work.

His first show was an exhibition titled “Pastoral” in 1991.

He has garnered critical acclaim abroad since making his international debut in 1995 in Hong Kong and Singapore.

One of his paintings, “The Changing Eye,” is now displayed at the Singapore Art Museum.

He held an exhibition titled Gao (Rice) with some other artists in Vietnam in 2005.

His success in using a new material - gouache on cheesecloth, paper or canvas - has been a significant contribution to the country’s contemporary art scene.

Cuong is also one of the few Vietnamese artists to have asserted his own conception of photography since he began taking pictures.

He is also a sculptor.