Yehezkiel Cyndo: Sketching Vietnam's Soul
What began as a personal project to travel around Southeast Asia, sketching the stories of diverse cities, their transformations, and their people, found a special inspiration when visual artist Yehezkiel Cyndo (from Indonesia) arrived in Vietnam. Now, collaborating with Vietnamese artists, he practices urban sketching to authentically tell the story of Vietnam's urban memories.
Upon meeting the Heritage Art Space Vietnam team, Cyndo shared information and initiated the "Asian Art Map: Telling the Story of the City between Hanoi and Semarang" project. With passion, Cyndo created a diary of urban sketches, capturing meaningful moments. After visiting Vietnam and Malaysia in 2024, he returned to Hanoi in 2025 to delve deeper into urban sketching.
At the "Urban Memories - Storytelling through Sketching" workshop, Cyndo showcased postcards featuring hundreds of houses in Semarang and Hanoi. This allowed participants to compare the urban landscapes of the two cities and choose how to capture authentic stories while sketching Hanoi's alleys and streets.
The workshop was co-hosted by artist Nguyen Vu Hai. Hai expressed his excitement about working with Cyndo and selecting the destinations. Hai said, "Behind the easy-to-understand sketches and simple lines lies a story that touches upon contemporary social issues." Indeed, as old buildings and houses in the Old Quarter change rapidly, the artist's mission is to document them in a diary of drawings.
Sketching urban Vietnam is also a way to expand Cyndo's "Discover with Cyndo" project, which explores cities across the region. Cyndo said that he must seize the moment and draw immediately because houses can disappear rapidly. These sketches are stories that receive social value over time.
With just a pen, a notebook, and a box of paints, Cyndo has traversed Hanoi's alleys to sketch. In his two weeks in Hanoi, his sketchbook filled up with drawings of the city from many different perspectives. Cyndo's subjects are diverse: from grilled fermented pork sausage, steamed bun shops, Hanoi pho, and motorbikes, to funny animals, historical sites like Bach Ma Temple and One Pillar Pagoda, and even the moss-covered, huddled houses on Lan Ong and Hang Buom streets.
Cyndo grew up in Yogyakarta, a city with many similarities to Hanoi, such as its moss-covered walls and bustling daily life. He studied Product Design and later joined the Jogja Sketching Group, where he learned to draw with his hands, eyes, and heart. He has published two illustrated books for children in Indonesia.
In 2021, Cyndo moved to Semarang, Indonesia and began a project to sketch 100 buildings in the city's Chinatown, preserving their beauty before they disappear. He also paints murals to remind people of the culture and the stories behind it. Cyndo hopes to share the stories of people's lives and dreams throughout Southeast Asia.
Although his time in Vietnam was short, Cyndo's passion for urban sketching has been warmly received. He is preserving memories and capturing the essence of Vietnamese cities simply and wholeheartedly: sketching to love and discover Vietnam more deeply./.
Story: Tran Van Photos: Thanh Giang/VNP Translated by Hong Hanh