ClappingTree’s Web 2.0

IT’S PROBABLY TIME TO HONOR a local talent. One of the very few living artists who has a museum dedicated in his name, at 460 Sims Avenue (near Geylang Lor 31), Singapore. Painter, calligrapher, poet, writer and philosopher Tan Swie Hian (TSH) received the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Crystal Award on 28th January 2003 in Davos, Switzerland - joining the ranks of Umberto Eco, Lord Menuhin, Paulo Coelho, Elie Wiesel…

A beautiful painting by TSH (on the right, above) is called the Night Kites. A critic (or admirer?) wrote that it is “an ecstatic phenomenon, a celebration of the power and the flux of creativity itself.” A friend commented that she could only see a stormy backdrop in this painting. For me, however, i see several orange butterfly-like kites flying above a gigantic lotus pond. Quite 诗情画意 (poetic). Yet, in a sense, this friend could be right. Maybe TSH is trying to show the triumph of one’s spirit in adversity through the soaring kites.

i guess this is the essence and beauty of abstract art — open interpretation. TSH’s art, btw, reminds me of Pollock’s. Just that TSH’s style at this point is perhaps more beautiful and controlled.

(Imported from a forum and edited.)