4 Profile


Provoke (1965), oil on board, 97.8 x 113.1 cm, collection of the artist Pago Pago II (1965), oil on canvas, 85.5 x 58 cm, collection of Zain Azahari


Pagoda I (1964), oil on canvas , 99.4 x 99.2 cm, collection of National Gallery Singapore. Image courtesy of National Heritage Board. Tis work has been adopted by BinjaiTree in memory of Chia Yew Kay and Tan Kim Siew


Malam Merah (Red Night) (1968), oil on canvas, 81.5 x 99.5 cm, collection of Zain Azahari


As to my frequent visits to the ethnic museum in Dahlem, they indeed represent a miracle and triggered a new direction or approach in my work. Prior to this, I was completing a lot of landscapes, floral and still-life compositions, basically typical studio works… I still remember when asked to go for “free sketches on weekends”, instead of going to the museums of European Classical Paintings, I decided to go to the ethnological and Asian museums in Dahlem. Tere, I studied the images of traditional objects and crafts from Southeast Asia, particularly the Tai and Khmer relic displays. Domes, cones, the thorn-like shapes of small pagodas interested me greatly and I completed a few ink sketches of them. Later in the classroom, I tried to transfer the


images with lino and woodcut techniques, but back then, I did not complete any painting based on these shapes. Four years later, in 1964 in Bangkok, I was confronted with the real shapes of pagodas. Although I stopped working on still-life pieces, I kept the position of objects. Consequently, instead of a cone, a bottle or a basket with fruits— as was the case with schematic still-life compositions – I began painting one, or two, Pago Pago shapes. Relying on thick and strong brush contour, I put them right there, frontal and monumental on the canvass. From then on, I became obsessed with that image, with an image of anything that looked ‘PagoPagoesque’. As a result, I completed hundreds of Pago Pago sketches and paintings over a period of five years from 1964 to 1969.


AAN: Would you rather consider yourself a realist or an abstract painter? LM: I am clearly an abstract painter.


AAN: Except for a short period in the late 1960s, your palette has remained very even within a set palette of colours. Did you feel that vivid colours were less able to express what you wanted? LM: No, I did not feel that vivid colours were a limitation of some sort. I like to use strong black lines for my drawings, and I like my painting to be monochrome.


AAN: You translated Goethe’s Faust into Malay. What specifically intrigues you with the person of Faust? LM: It was Faust’s character in


aaa asianartnewspaper.archive ASIAN ART SEPTEMBER 2018


Goethe’s epic poem that was so intriguing to me: the old learned professor who was ready to sell his soul to Mephistopheles, the cunning and cynical devil in exchange for feeling young, virile again, and the lust for the innocent village girl! ... However, Faust as a Western man is more than that, and even more complex seen in modern times: endless transformations of his character have been made from drama to films, graphic novels and other media, especially in Germany until today—so I was told. Amazing!


AAN: You have had a retrospective touring in Europe and in Southeast Asia that has kept you away from the studio. What are your upcoming projects? LM: I cannot wait to paint again,


attacking my large white canvases after such a long interval. For the past year and a half, while finishing the 9-metre high sculpture project in Singapore and publishing my Travel Notes 1960s in Kuala Lumpur, I have had these exciting distractions. It was especially so with the preparations for the “Pago Pago” exhibition at the Centre Pompidou in Paris, which took place from March to May 2018. As it looks now, my next project is certainly a painting exhibition. At the moment, I have no idea of its title or its theme, but I guess as usual, I just have to go from one canvas to another. • Te exhibition Pago Pago has moved to ILHAM in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and is currently on view until 30 December 2018


Download and read our unique archive of interviews with artists from around the world. Visit at asianartnewspaper.com/subscribe ... to stay in touch every month


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32