Singapore Art Appreciation

Chen Soo Pieng Landscape

Stepped into the National Museum of Singapore this morning as I wanted to see the People's Collection which showcases some of the artefacts of post war Singapore from 50s to 80s.

But I was pleasantly surprised to see an art exhibition by local artists in one of the hall. The name of exhibition is A Changed World: Singapore Art 1950s to 1970s. It was raining heavily outside so I stayed back and listen to the exhibition by a guide, Ms Geraldine Tan. The artists include Chen Wen Xi, Chen Soo Pieng, Chua Mie Tee, Liu Kang and many others. They were Singapore pioneer artists who had been trained in the traditional chinese painting and exposed to western paintings in post war era. Today is the last day of exhibition.

The guide explained the intend of various paintings well. In western paintings from my trip to Europe many years ago, I learned that artist used paintings to hide certain message and was conveying certain narrative of the times. One must closely examine the paintings to understand and interpret the paintings.

I like Chen Soo Pieng landscape impression shown above. My interpretation is that it shows a house in an isolated place next to a tree. The colours are rather sombre which gives a rather depressed feeling. There are patches of white above the house which I interpet as smoke from the house. There is another unique significance which I notice is the portrait format of a landscape painting. I also notice that the black strokes have chinese paintings tradition. The presentation reminded me of some western style paintings. However, the name of the artist at the left bottom corner in chinese is significant evidence that it was painted by a chinese local artist. The name shows "Si (4 horizontal lines) Ping".  Soo Pieng was famous for painting balinese women with elongated arms, which are his signature features. I understand from the guide that his painting is found in $50 Singapore note (rear).

It is sometimes good to appreciate cultural art piece.