Chang Fee Ming's watercolors set a new standard

Chang Fee Ming's watercolors set a new standard

Carla Bianpoen, Contributor/Jakarta

Chang Fee Ming's Mekong Series in watercolor, pen and ink will open at the Galeri Nasional on Aug. 2, officiated by the Indonesian ambassadors to those countries through which the Mekong flows, along with art lover tycoon Jusuf Wanandi.

The 12th longest river in the world and known as the Mother of Waters, the 4,800 km Mekong sustains over 60 million people by providing food, water, transportation and many other daily necessities. The river runs from its source on the Tibetan Plateau through China's Yunnan province, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

Chang's series also includes studies and sketches in ink on stamped postcards, receipts and other ordinary scraps of paper.

As the forces of development and progress seep into even the most remote corners of the world, including the lands of the Mekong, his drawings may be the first -- and last -- to capture in an Asian perspective the rapidly disappearing, traditional peoples of the Mekong.

Created during three-month jaunts over several years, these works are made even more valuable because of the spirit behind them. As Chang said: "To travel, see and paint is a way of learning, a life philosophy, a value that shares the romance and nostalgia of a time when artists dreamed of discovering new lands and cultures and to paint them." Further, he wanted to express his feeling of belonging to Southeast Asia.

Luminous, sometimes somber, but always intense, the watercolors portray people, places, communities and cultures that, in the face of modernization, carry on their traditions and customs. Much of this is revealed in Chang's detailed depiction of the traditional dress, sashes and textiles that personify the tribal and traditional peoples he met during his travels.

While these rustic images may conjure nostalgia, Chang has not closed his eyes to the political turbulence and ensuing trauma of the region, which continues to this day. The Scar, Tonle Sap and Cambodia 2000 embody these concerns.

The series, comprising 30 small portraits, 26 large paintings and 14 small watercolors, is the fruit of Chang Fee Ming's extraordinary exploration with watercolor.

Says Malaysia-based visual artist Wong Hoy Chong: "By playing with both thin and thick layers over the pigment, Chang has found ways to overlay translucence over opacity and vice-versa, such that the final painted surface is incredibly tactile and material, but without losing the glowing transparency afforded by watercolors. In a way, he worked in a process much like that of an oil painter, manipulating the translucence and opacity inherent in the pigments and dyes."

From a distance, some of his work look like oil paintings, particularly his large drawings and sketches.

His past work carries a touch of photographic realism, but some new development is apparent in this series. Omen, Tachileik and Myanmar 2003 are all atmospheric and infused with emotion, the last featuring a woman looking sorrowfully over a lush landscape under a darkening sky. Meanwhile, Lines of Life, Chiang Khong and Thailand 2002 stand testament to his skill in bringing out texture with the minutest details.

He has captured a broad range of facial expressions in his Mekong portraits of both young and old -- a new feature in Chang's work, according to exhibition curator Beverly Yong.

"Previously, the vast majority of his works have shown at most the torso or the lower half of the human figure, focusing on clothing and feet," she said.

Chang was born in 1959 in Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia. Growing up on the coast, said Yong, he learned at a very young age to harness his medium to portray the changing degrees of a day or the ebb and flow of the sea. He has become fluent with the many variations of light in Asia and its gradations of density to capture the gradients of temperature and luminescence into a sensual impression of a particular place.

The idea for the Mekong series began while Chang was conducting research for another series and coalesced as he delved deeper into the region, exploring the links between the Terengganu and Mekong peoples. In particular, he studied the Muslim Cham, who came from Vietnam and Cambodia and settled in the northern Malaysian Kelantan and Terengganu states, and the Muslim Yunanese, traces of whom have also been found in Terengganu.

His search is ongoing, and there is no guessing as to the extent to which Chang's watercolors will evolve in the future, as even now, he seems to be setting a new standard in watercolor paintings.

The Jakarta leg of the touring exhibition, which started in April in Kuala Lumpur and was held at the Chiang Mai Art Museum in May, is organized by Valentine Willie Fine Arts Malaysia in cooperation with Kupu-Kupu Art Project Management.

A Touring Exhibition of the Mekong Series by Chang Fee Ming will run from Aug. 2 through Aug. 11 at the Galeri Nasional Jakarta, Jl. Medan Merdeka Timur 14, Gambir, Central Jakarta. Phone: 021- 34833954