Bull Market for South-East Asian Art
7 min read
When Indonesian artist and pioneer Raden Saleh sold Deer Hunt for SG$2.8mil in an auction in 1996, it changed the art landscape in Southeast Asia. It whet the w...
History and Heritage Carved with Heart
6 min read
Traditions die hard, but once a traditional artefact or skill is gone, the extant works in that tradition retreat and assume “relic” status. So it i...
Lunar Peaks – A Treasure Gone Forever
7 min read
Late National Artist Laureate Datuk Syed Ahmad Jamal's (1929-2011) heritage sculpture monument, Puncak Purnama (Lunar Peaks), was demolished by the Kuala Lumpur...
Working a Wonderful World
7 min read
Anthony Lau.“Please write it down,” he commands. Then, he squints closer to eyeball the small blackboard to read the chalk scribblings, someti...
Fired by the Charm of Ceramics
6 min read
A flurry of contemporary ceramic exhibitions in recent months has finally reignited interest in this apparent niche art.Within a space of three months, benchm...
A Journey into the Testy World of Colonial Art
7 min read
A makeshift platform next to the replica statue of Sir Stamford Raffles set up on July 22, 2000, at the man’s purported first landing site allowed those w...
Still Promoting Art After All These Years
7 min read
Syaiful Rachman from Redsea Gallery (Singapore).It isn’t easy to start something and keep it going for 10 years, maintaining more than a modicum of...
A Mountain is Much More than a Mountain
5 min read
AdvertisementJames Sum’s mountainscapes can be split into more traditional Chinese inkand-(limited) colour constructs, and more dialectical yet ly...
Art That Found Immortality in 2016
7 min read
Artists tend to be linked to two deathrelated myths: that they lead longer lives, and that their stature grows the longer they live. But death comes to all, w...
Wandering Souls in a Forbidden Land
8 min read
Ruang Dapur (collection of Universiti Sains Malaysia). Note: Work shown is a replica, as original is on loan to a Singapore exhibition.Realiti B...
Tribute to a Visionary Virtuoso
7 min read
John Lee Joo-for, one of the greatest acts in post-Independence Malaysian art and Australian Biblical stage theatre, has died. He breathed his last on June 11 i...
Remembering Tan Choon Ghee in Ink and Watercolour
6 min read
A rare 1961 self-portrait captures Penang’s legendary watercolourist Tan Choon Ghee (Chen Cun-yi) as a strapping 31-year-old, his gaze intent and his eyes...