Malaysian painter and installation artist Chang Yoong Chia (b. 1975) has created a series of collage works using postage stamps and their varied imagery, particularly flora & fauna and political figures, as art material. The new works will form the exhibition The world is flat at Richard Koh Fine Art Singapore 12 August through 2 September 2011.
In his new series, with fixation and creative skill, Chang Yoong Chia pieces together minute details cut from stamps of several nations to produce maps, portraits, invented political occasions, and scenes on land and at sea, as well as whimsical constructions that seem to defy nature yet come together with precision and an element of surprise. As is typical for the artist, the works combine a contemporary atmosphere with one of nostalgia, wisdom and childlike fantasy.
Showing this series for the first time, The world is flat exhibition is the culmination of a painstaking project begun in 2009. It explores new practice for the artist and delivers revised and illustrative plays on world history. The exhibition will startle viewers with Yoong Chia’s discovery that stamps and their variety of colour tones and content provide wide range from which to generate new visuals and express the artist’s own ideas and imagination. His fresh and seemingly limitless combinations created from the all-too-familiar postage stamp are enough to make younger generations appreciate these almost out of date objects in new light.
The popular approaches for which Chang Yoong Chia is well-known; his narrative content, his love of animals and respect for the relationship between humans and nature, and his expanse of patience and attention to detail are all evident within the new series, with the exciting added dimension of recent developments in Yoong Chia’s artistic methods. Working closely with stamps, their origins, subject matter and associations triggered memories and emotions within the artist, in turn generating new themes and ideas.
In contemporary times postage stamps, no longer a definite part of everyday life, can give us a romanticised perspective - especially when handled by Chang Yoong Chia. At times the work contains reference to geographical, social and political history, retaining the implications of its source material, often with a decided angle of either amusement or positivity. Through The world is flat, stamps become both an important metaphor for a slower-paced lifestyle, and an unexpected and beautiful avenue through which the artist offers the notion of unlimited possibilities as well as a gentler version of our heretofore accepted reality.
Chang Yoong Chia, Artist's Statement:
“Almost everyone around my age and above used to collect stamps when they were children, so there’ a collective memory shared between us. Younger people don’t: stamps are disappearing.”
“Stamps used to evoke curiosity and wonder about other countries but the images and the information on stamps are usually state sanctioned and therefore only portray positive sides of countries. So stamps represent to me an end of the era of an ‘official’ world view.”
“As Malaysia was also a British colony, and stamps originated from Great Britain – Queen Elizabeth II is the person most portrayed on stamps – it is interesting to find my own culture and history through using stamps in my art. Stamps remind me of the colonial era, particularly Europeans and particularly Great Britain, which used to have the biggest colonial empire in the world.”
“I’m also interested in the laborious process of making these stamp collages. They really test my physical and mental endurance. It’s a very slow art-making process that counteracts the fast-paced, production line society we live in. There should be a slower, less destructive way of living and I hope my art practice reflects that.”
“I also work with stamps with images of flowers from different countries - I cut and paste them together to form bouquets. There’s so much conflict between countries, it’s nice to create beautiful floral arrangements and soften the conflict a little.”
Suraya Warden, Curator:
“Chang Yoong Chia’s new work has to be seen to be believed – the impact of something as familiar as postage stamps being used to change our perspective on social and geographical relationships is really huge, not least because of the concentration involved in making works in this way and at this scale. It cannot be stressed enough that Yoong Chia’s sweet and incredibly detailed approach to his art, which takes many different forms, is once again the factor that raises the bar in the new series.”
“The collage works are a comparable continuation of other works that have been acquired for protection and display by places such as Singapore Art Museum, yet they take the artist’s approach and in some ways tackle a regional and global view rather than a very personalised or local one.”
“As we view Chang Yoong Chia’s art both our hearts and our minds slowly expand until final realisations tie everything together in a satisfying and enlightening way. We have seen this in his narrative installations that actually have a beginning, middle and an end. I think as humans we are naturally drawn to the art of Chang Yoong Chia because it is so genuine and positive, and because it can amaze but in fact does not involve any deliberate showmanship.”
“Yoong Chia is a master of manipulating materials yet not in the ways common in contemporary sculpture today that so often play with size and scale and object. Instead, a slow learning process takes place for the viewer who commits to a moment of interaction. There is none of the immediate punch of flashy contemporary work, the payoff is in many ways larger as there is both a fascinating visual surface and layers and layers of meaning below.”
