Fourteen Months in Thao Dien

Fourteen Months in Thao Dien documents the author’s first fourteen months living in the Thao Dien district of Saigon, Vietnam, weaving street and travel photography into a unified visual narrative. The street section lingers within the neighborhood, observing daily life with patience and proximity—capturing gestures, quiet routines, shifting light, and the subtle textures of place. The travel section extends beyond Thao Dien to other regions of Vietnam, tracing movement, contrast, and the rhythm of departure and return. Together, the photographs create a lived-in portrait of time and transition—an intimate record of immersion in a community while remaining attentive to the wider landscape. About the Author Mark Aaron Coffield is a photographer and author whose work focuses on street and travel photography in Vietnam, documenting everyday life through atmosphere, gesture, and place. His images capture unguarded, fleeting moments shaped by long-term immersion in Vietnam’s streets, neighborhoods, and quieter edges. Born in West Virginia, Coffield has lived and worked internationally, including extended time in Italy, South Korea, Thailand, China, Hong Kong, and Vietnam. These experiences inform his visual narrative style, which favors observation over spectacle and seeks to convey how a place feels rather than how it is typically portrayed. He is the author of two previous photography books. Fourteen Months in Thao Dien is his third.