Artist’s Statement: In December 2014, I visited Laos. It was a trip of ‘returns’: a return to travelling alone after not having done so for a long time, a return to travel sketching, a return to the very basics of art… the sweetest return from this trip was when one of my images received the Silver Award in the Established Category at the United Overseas Bank Painting of the Year 2015.
Equipping myself with merely pencil, pen and sketchpad in Laos was not so much a matter of convenience as it was an artistic decision. Twenty-five years of practice had made techniques second nature and I wanted to recall them.
From Vientiane through Vang Vieng to Luang Prabang and back, I studied and rendered whatever caught my attention, in the grey of graphite, the black of ink and the white of paper. Simplifying my medium and support gave me a renewed appreciation of art-making; once again I became aware of contrasting shapes, varying lines, nuances of tone… the building blocks of artwork. I felt inspired by a reignited sense of wonder.
In an age where images are consumed and discarded in haste, my hope for this exhibition is that my artwork engages and sustains your interest as you delight in the images as a whole and observe the detail in each drawing. I invite you, as I have, to see and look at Laos.
Venue: Utterly Art Exhibition Space, 20B Mosque Street (Level 3), Singapore 059500
Hours: By appointment, Tel: 94872006 or 62262605 (Keng Hock)
When: 10 - 25 Mar 2018,
By: Utterly Art
