'Lotus With Love' by Nikki Liaw
Fong Kim Sing sets his accomplished brush to canvas once more to create his ephemeral waterscapes of white lotuses and lilies haloed by dancing dragonflies and, to those familiar with Fong’s work, the elegant black butterfly that becomes his visual signature.
Many have sung praises and scribed admirations of this Kedah-born artist’s opus over the years, and while it seems at times that all there is to be said about Fong has been spoken, upon seeing his paintings (both new and preceding) it is difficult to deny the urge to put into some form the essence of what transpires in this experience. And with it, the hope that our interpretations will contribute in some measure to what we know of Fong and his paintings, shedding a little bit more light on why they move us and why they so often warrant a second glance. After all, the more light there is the clearer we see, and in Fong’s misty sceneries of lotus and nature there exists manifold depths that would require a degree of insight to fathom.
Towards this insight, first there must be understanding of the crux of Fong’s art. Just as the artist searches for his or her own direction (dare I say, destiny?), reflecting this inner and outward quest in the works of their hands, so the audience searches for meaning within those fine reflections. That which we endeavour to put into words; our criticisms, justifications, descriptions and reasons, are but tools in the attempt to bridge the gap between intellect and emotion, head-knowledge and heart-knowledge.
With that in mind, technicalities and categorising take a back seat to the fundamental act of simply appreciating an artwork by feeling its echoes within oneself. This applies in particular to Fong’s paintings as they are all heart, for what other medium could possibly realise such evocative and moving images articulated by so many as romantic, heartfelt, refreshing, tranquil? Steadfast in his principles, Fong is known for being an ardent disciple of sincerity in art, believing that its highest form is the outpouring of the entirety of his personal emotions without concern to whether it is ‘right or wrong’. Considering Fong’s many solo and group exhibitions here and abroad that adorn his list of achievements, we can hazard a guess that it has been more right than not. Perhaps this is how, almost instinctively, gallery owner Syed Nabil recognised the quiet genius of Fong’s self-taught art early on. From this is born the latest of many momentous outcomes; Fong’s seventh solo exhibition at NN Gallery. Thirty-two works that are thirty-two windows into Fong’s artistic journey since 1967 including those after his 60th retrospective.
Of the beginnings of his journey, Fong grew up amongst paddy fields, misty lotus ponds and coastal scenes that instilled within him a deep love for nature and the pastoral. In discovering his passion for art, he would then seek to translate unto canvas the relationship between man and nature while illustrating the temporality of life. Denied the opportunity of a formal art education due to poverty, he worked day jobs for many years to support his artistic endeavours as he painted at night, starting with a realist approach before settling into an abstract style that he still practices today. Through difficult times, Fong persistently refined his craft, exploring different mediums and themes while fraternising with artist peers and contemporaries. Fong recalls times when he could not even afford to buy paint brushes, painful times when in the lowest period of his life that almost caused him to lose his love for art. Hence, in his early days, Fong purposed to express his sorrows and hardships through his paintings; particularly within the white-spotted black butterfly that becomes the inclusion of his self into his idyllic reality he so longs to reach.
Upon his fiftieth year, the picturesque lotus and lily ponds became a hallmark of his works and a mark of the maturity of his style. After his sixtieth year and in his new works, the dim spectral colours and calm composition became vibrantly iridescent and joyously lively with flight and movement. This likely signifies a turning point in his art and life, a firm direction that will further cement Fong’s craft and surely set his works apart from conventional renditions of this popular symbolic blossom.
After combing through the dictionary arsenal of verbal ammunition to, in a sense, put an all-encompassing caption befitting these ‘windows’ into Fong’s life, the most apt would be: flow. From the very beginning of Fong’s process of creation till the painting is displayed for all to see, there exists a flow. In his life full of active travelling to and from his Northern homeland, and in the passage of his life; especially of his georgic childhood that remains a powerful theme of his paintings, and the pursuit of his art, this metaphoric flow is skilfully and passionately interpreted in Fong’s artworks. And in his artworks there is doubtless a harmonious flow in the exquisite blending of colours and textures, brisk strokes of paint, between the ever-present mist and water, the poised bow of reeds and leaves, in the iridescent wings of his dragonflies and the gentle flutter of butterflies. Even between a series of his paintings and each individual composition, there is a sequence also. Finally, in observing this tranquil cornucopia there is the concluding course of the viewer committing such artistry to memory (or better, unto the walls of their abodes).
As such, there can surely be no title more fitting to epitomise the inspired timbre of this collection than this simple and sincere expression that comes from the heart (for where else is the source of adoration?):
To Lotus with Love.
May you find your own meaning, your dreams and emotions, sorrows and happiness, and finally peace and tranquillity within Fong’s white lotuses under the quiet eye of a diaphanous sun.
