
In 2017, Tu visited Da Lat Market in Da Lat city located in Lam Dong Province, central Vietnam. Tu has developed an interest of taking photos of Vietnamese markets for years now. This project was the first collection taken in 2017. The upcoming collection is on processing.
Vietnamese markets are places where people can find almost every needed grocery including fresh vegetable, fresh meat, and even fresh seafood, etc. The energetic scenery of Vietnamese markets is depicted through the images of the sellers, the buyers and their movements.
Throughout these photographs, the viewers would have chance to experience a Vietnamese ordinary market. Besides, the viewers also have chance to engage the stories of the people in the markets. This could be a story about an 80 year - old woman who is required to continue working at this age in order to take care of her 6 year - old grandson; or this could another story about a young mother coming to buy groceries prepared for her son's graduation's party.
Tu's photographs are mostly candid that were usually taken neither with the subjects' consent nor the prior preparation. Tu intentionally approaches the subject's stories through their expressed emotions and transfers them into images. At some time, Tu would directly approach to the photographed people' stories through some small conversations with them.
For Tu, the photographers are people who keep and illustrate the stories, while the viewers are the ones who have rights to deal with the stories themselves.