Chinese ink artists are back in the spotlight

Chinese ink painting is alive and well in Singapore. There will be at least seven exhibitions, including three now ongoing at the National Gallery Singapore.

Chinese ink art, which involves applying ink with a brush on paper, is one of the oldest living art traditions. Its history dates back 3,000 years.

Prominent Chinese ink painters in Singapore's art history include the innovative artist Chen Wen Hsi, whose iconic gibbons appear on the $50 note.

Next month, the Chui Huay Lim Club in Keng Lee Road is mounting an exhibition in tribute to the late ink master Fan Chang Tien. The artist, who died in 1987, taught high-profile students including Chua Ek Kay and Henri Chen.The 11-day exhibition comprises about 150 artworks by Fan, his students and his students' students.

Chua and Chen are among the 17 students whose works are on display, while the exhibition's 18 third-generation artists include Ang Cheng Chye and Tan Mui San.

National University of Singapore Professor Heng Chye Kiang, 59, who was Fan's last student, says: "He was one of the most renowned artists of his generation.

"He didn't seek fame or fortune. He just wanted to pass down the culture of Chinese ink painting and calligraphy to his students."

Ms Teresa Yao, who is in her 70s and is one of Fan's adopted daughters, is hoping to spread awareness of her father's legacy through the exhibition.

"An artist from China told me, 'Your father is in the wrong place. In Singapore, he is like a pearl hidden in a grain of sand'," she says.

Tomorrow, Chinese ink artist Tan Kee Sek, 66, will open his solo exhibition at Ion Gallery in Ion Orchard. The show, with works from 1968 to this year, celebrates 50 years of the artist's practice.

"I felt 50 years is a good time to give myself a report card of my work.

"The time left for me is not much and I wanted to leave something behind for people and see how I can develop my art," he says.

And at Ins' Art International gallery in Bras Basah Complex, a solo exhibition by second-generation Chinese ink artist Tan Oe Pang, 70, has been extended by a week. It will close on June 18.

According to Ins' gallery owner Janet Fong, Tan's works have not been publicly shown for more than 10 years.

The National Gallery Singapore is betting that today's audiences will relate to Chinese ink paintings.

It has been holding three ink exhibitions - Strokes Of Life: The Art Of Chen Chong Swee, Wu Guanzhong: A Walk Through Nature and Rediscovering Treasures: Ink Art From The Xiu Hai Lou Collection.

These represent a total of 200 ink works, including masterpieces never seen before in public.

Mr Low Sze Wee, the gallery's director of curatorial, collections and education, says that ink art has remained largely unchanged for the past 3,000 years and continues to be practised, collected and studied by many today.

He adds: "This reflects the importance that tradition and heritage continue to play in contemporary society, particularly the instinctive human need to develop one's sense of cultural identity through tradition and heritage."