Compilation of photographs taken during the preparation for the first opening of 'Hanoin Henki' at the gallery of the Artists' Association of Oulu. Vu Dan Tan is seen in the album cutting different figures from cardboard boxes - the finished products would be later displayed on the gallery floor; visitors were invited to paint them during the opening. Marrita Numi, a Hanoi-based artist and one of the curators of the exhibition, is also captured in the album (image 3 and 4) next to Tan.
The production of the works on-site was owing to the delayed shipment of the selected artworks from Vietnam; the container was put on detention and underwent multiple searches amid soliciting an authorisation from the Vietnamese Ministry of Culture. Participating artists also carried unframed paintings from Hanoi to Oulu to back up the opening of the show. News coverage on such incidents had in turned stirred interest among the local community - 'Hanoin Henki' received up to 200 visitors per day throughout the exhibition period.

'Hanoin Henki' (or 'Spirit of Hanoi') was a visual art project conceptualised and proposed by Pauli Mustonen (Cultural Attaché of the Finnish Embassy of Finland, Vietnam), Maritta Nurmi (Finnish artist resided in Hanoi), and Eric Leroux (French artist and frequent collaborator with Salon Natasha), on the occasion of the Asian Art and Culture Festival in Finland. The curatorial team intended to present to the audience an ecology of the Vietnamese art scene, namely the interconnections between art creation, daily life, artist/public interaction and collaboration; as well as the co-existence and exchanges between traditions and modernity in various art forms. Salon Natasha — a multi-functional artist-run space — was hence chosen to be represented and reconstructed as an installation in the Festival.
The project was presented in two exhibitions held in Helsinki and Oulu respectively.