NGUYEN NHU Y has no C.V. He is around 30 years old but even his age and date of birth is open to speculation. It is said that he was a first class scholar at the University of Fine Arts in Hanoi studying sculpture. At the end of the first year of study he suffered a massive psychotic breakdown that signalled the end of his formal training as and artist. For the next two years he lived in the mountains of North Vietnam working on a farm and being cared for by the indigenous minority people of the Hmong tribe. He returned to Hanoi homeless and impoverished. Despite his inability to cope with the completion of his course the senior lecturers at the institute took him back into the class. Here he would continue to carve totem-like figures from wood in the manner of a man possessed. He now lives in a house that resembles a small cowshed in a non-descript village about 50 kilometres outside Hanoi. He continues to work prolifically, carving his prodigious sculptures with outstanding physical ability. Pure and unsophisticated, these wooden effigies are emblematic. Animist belief dictates that a person's soul cannot transcend into another life unless a physical embodiment of that soul is carved. It is impossible to know exactly how much insight Nguyen Nhu Y has about his creative impulses but his statues are strongly suggestive of morbidity and schizophrenic detachment. His work can be seen all over Hanoi, in corners of souvenir and craft shops, they are sold for just a few dollars each. He lives a hand to mouth existence. Any money that is occasionally gained from a sale is usually dispensed of within hours of reception. Although tortured by his internal demons, he is always pleased to be in company, and often cuts a joyful figure. He is held in great respect by some of the most successful and gifted of Hanoi's artistic elite who have empathy for the simplicity of his life. He is the natural in their midst. A Savage Messiah.