Mr. Ho Tu Anh, a DTU Freelance Designer, has just won second prize in a contest to design a logo depicting “Forty Years of Dialog, Friendship and Trust” to celebrate forty years of diplomatic relations between Vietnam and the German Federal Republic, organized by the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany to Vietnam.
In recent years, “logo wizard” and “king of logos” have become the nicknames Ho Tu Anh’s colleagues have affectionately given him to show their esteem.
Designer Ho Tu Anh
Lucky awards
Mr Ho Tu Anh discovered his passion for logo design when he was a student of graphic design at the Faculty of Applied Arts at the Hue College of Arts. But for many reasons he did not yet have the opportunity then to pursue that passion, leaving him to only sporadically and randomly create them.
In 2011, Mr. Tu Anh took first-place at the slogan competition held by the International Education Institute of Vietnam National University in Ho Chi Minh City. In 2012, Tu Anh finished among the top 10 finalists with a poster for the 20th San Diego Latino Film Festival, which was displayed at the Festival. Tu Anh also won second prize at a logo design contest at the Community Integration and Development Foundation in Ho Chi Minh City and came third in a logo Design contest for Digital Television of Vietnam, organized by the Ministry of Information and Communications, in late 2013.
In 2014, Tu Anh won second prize in the “Protecting Rhinos Together” poster design contest by harmoniously merging images and typography to successfully convey a profound message. The contest was organized in June 2014 by EWT, an NGO actively engaged in ecosystem and endangered wildlife protection in southern Africa. One of the EWT initiatives is to prohibit rhinoceros hunting for the exploitation of their horns and to protect all wildlife species on the brink of extinction.
Most recently, he has just won second prize in a contest to design a logo depicting “Forty Years of Dialog, Friendship and Trust” to celebrate forty years of diplomatic relations between Vietnam and the German Federal Republic.
At DTU, besides working for the Graphics Center, Mr. Tu Anh teaches Design Basics and Designing Trademark Identity Systems for students of Arts Multimedia Design in the Faculty of Architecture. DTU students have benefited from his teaching. In recent years, DTU students have won many big prizes in local and national Graphic Design Competitions.
“Creating a logo can be seen as an experience,” Tu Anh confides. “When obtaining a prize, it is like receiving recognition that one is going in the right direction. Therefore, even though awards are not everything, they do form a motivation to increase one’s enthusiasm for one’s work and one’s passion.”
A passion hand in hand with community benefit
About the design of the logo for “Forty Years of Dialog, Friendship and Trust”, Tu Anh says, “Diplomatic relations, mutual commitment, and support between Vietnam and Germany in their development are nothing new, but it was not easy to create an idea and to find a new and expressive image that would stick in people’s minds. After a month researching, I decided to integrate the two famous monuments, the German Brandenburg Gate and the Van Mieu Quoc Tu Giam to denote the close friendship between the two countries.”
The haunting poster shows a baby rhinoceros, slowly dying because his horns have been cut off, with his mother hugging him in his dying moments. Ho Tu Anh made the attendees at the contest reflect upon how misconception and greed can seriously damage our environment and wildlife. Furthermore, by highlighting the word “NO” in “RhiNO”, Ho Tu Anh managed to convey two messages at the same time: “Don’t Hunt and Kill the Rhinoceros” and “Protect the Rhinoceros”, which garnered the jury’s special acclaim for his poster.
“I get so many worthwhile things out of these contests, more experience, the chance to talk with other designers and ask questions, to get immersed in the real world and to improve my own knowledge and skills.” said designer Ho Tu Anh.
“It is really beneficial for myself, in my work and my life. The “Protecting Rhinos Together” poster design contest in particular carries a special meaning for someone like me working in Education. It’s is essentially a humanitarian cause and my designs are obligated to call out to our community to protect nature and rare species and thereby also to protect our own living environment.”
About creativity, “logo wizard” Ho Tu Anh’s concept is that creative trends in art in general and logo creation in particular will change over time. The style he likes most is minimalism, as, according to him, it is the most valuable one, and the force of a logo is in its conciseness. “Whichever school or style you belong to, your creation is only meaningful if it is practical and useful for the comunity,” the artist says.
(Media Center)