Details
CollectionSouth & Southeast Asian Collection
Object numberS1999-0021-001-0
TitleFortune Teller
CreatorLim Mu Hue (1936)
Description“At first glance, the Fortune Teller provides rich details depicting a Chinese fortune-teller smoking opium, lying languidly beside his stall. Mu Hue's attention to details provides an excellent opportunity for social commentary on Chinese beliefs and customs concerning fate and the fun-damental core belief in luck. The woodcut features two main aspects of fortune-telling: facial fortune-telling and palmistry. Opium, the symbol of Chinese weakness as a result of the Opium Wars in China in the nineteenth century provides a clue to Mu Hue's perception on fortune telling. Not unlike opium, fortune-telling is regarded by Mu Hue as an aspect of Chinese custom that requires changing as the Chinese believe in divination and fate, which is linked to superstition. Perhaps Mu Hue is trying to show how a person's desire to change his or her own fate or to avoid bad luck is potentially as addictive and destructive as opium itself.”
(Crossroads: The Making of New Identities, Page 42).
An edition printed in 1998 from the 1966 woodcut, Lim Mu Hue’s Fortune Teller brings to life a Chinese fortune teller surrounded by the accoutrements of his trade. There is a casual air about him with half his pyjamas bottom rolled up a leg and a foot propped on a stool as he passes an idle moment smoking a pipe of opium and reading a book. Lim’s attention to details accords the print narrative richness and realism. His interest is to portray a real character, down to the tattoos on the old man’s forearm. Fortune Teller exemplifies Lim’s approach of personalised tableaux where the anecdotes he portrays are arrived at by close observation and personal encounters.
An old bespectacled fortune-teller is seated on a box beside his elaborately set-up stall. He is smoking a long pipe held in his right hand and reading an almanac clutched in his left. His right leg is crossed over his left which is fully stretched to rest on a small stool. His richly decorated table is chock-a-block with the paraphernalia of his trade. An empty stool awaits his customer. In the background are strung up pennants with Chinese calligraphy and diagrams illustrating physiognomy and palmistry. This is a very fine example of Lim Mu Hue's consummate skill as a printmaker, and enhanced his reputation as an interpreter of local Chinese life style and customs.
Production placeSingapore
Production date 1966
Object categoryWoodblock Print
MaterialInk on paper
TechniquePrintmaking
Dimensions
H: 27 cm
L: 35 cm
L: 35 cm
