Toya: Stretching Batik to Its Limits
By Ooi Kok Chuen
July 2011 PENANG PALETTE
Traditional art media tend to lead to traditional art pieces. Not so in the case of Penang painter, Toya. His art builds on very original uses of batik techniques, and the effects are, naturally, very original. The fear now is that this knowledge will not be passed down to younger artists.A CAUCASIAN who claimed to be an expert asked Toya where the batik painting exhibition was, blithely unaware that he was looking at batik paintings! That was at his exhibition...
Ooi Kok Chuen
is an art-writer and journalist, and the author of MAHSURI: A Legend Reborn (Ooi Peeps Publishing), an adult contemporary fantasy “movel” (a novel conceived as a mock movie) spun from a local legend.
