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Actions Displays	Details Remove from selection Add to selection CollectionSouth & Southeast Asian Collection Object numberS1980-0774-001-0 TitleStreet Scene CreatorChoo Keng Kwang Description“Although the Peranakan House is the subject matter of Kim Seng's interest, it is what goes on inside the house that is his real concern. Kim Seng draws the viewer to the focal point of this painting, which is the interior of the house by leading the viewer through the doorway and into the house. He achieves this by using dark colours, tinged with red to depict the interior of the house, injecting a sense of mystery and trepidation through his masterful use of composition, colour and tonal effects.” (Crossroads: The Making of New Identities, Page 55). With Street Scene, Choo Keng Kwan depicts the old quarters of Singapore's Chinatown with its narrow back alleys and shophouses, and the everyday activities of its community. Rendered in an impressionistic manner, the painting is thematically and stylistically characteristic of Choo's oeuvre in the mid-1960s and 1970s when he turned his attention from social realism and woodcuts to paintings that capture the flavours of life and the urban landscape of Chinatown, Little India and Arab Street. For many artists of his generation, these enclaves from the British colonial era represented a heritage at threat as the push of modernity and urban re-development proceeded to erase these emblems of the past. True to Impressionism, this is a study of the effect of light on a street in Chinatown. Attention is focused on the lower middle section of the painting where the light picks out the throng crowding the street without spelling out the details. This spotlighting to highlight street activities was used again and again by the artist in his Chinatown series. In his later Chinatown paintings he romanticized the ambiance, increasing further his nostalgic feeling for an old world charm. Production placeSingapore Object categoryPainting MaterialOil on board Dimensions H: 73 cm L: 58 cm

CollectionSouth & Southeast Asian Collection

Object numberS1980-0774-001-0

TitleStreet Scene

Description“Although the Peranakan House is the subject matter of Kim Seng's interest, it is what goes on inside the house that is his real concern. Kim Seng draws the viewer to the focal point of this painting, which is the interior of the house by leading the viewer through the doorway and into the house. He achieves this by using dark colours, tinged with red to depict the interior of the house, injecting a sense of mystery and trepidation through his masterful use of composition, colour and tonal effects.” (Crossroads: The Making of New Identities, Page 55). With Street Scene, Choo Keng Kwan depicts the old quarters of Singapore's Chinatown with its narrow back alleys and shophouses, and the everyday activities of its community. Rendered in an impressionistic manner, the painting is thematically and stylistically characteristic of Choo's oeuvre in the mid-1960s and 1970s when he turned his attention from social realism and woodcuts to paintings that capture the flavours of life and the urban landscape of Chinatown, Little India and Arab Street. For many artists of his generation, these enclaves from the British colonial era represented a heritage at threat as the push of modernity and urban re-development proceeded to erase these emblems of the past. True to Impressionism, this is a study of the effect of light on a street in Chinatown. Attention is focused on the lower middle section of the painting where the light picks out the throng crowding the street without spelling out the details. This spotlighting to highlight street activities was used again and again by the artist in his Chinatown series. In his later Chinatown paintings he romanticized the ambiance, increasing further his nostalgic feeling for an old world charm.

Production placeSingapore

Object categoryPainting

MaterialOil on board

Dimensions

H: 73 cm
L: 58 cm

Details