Object numberS1999-0011-002-0
TitleBaba's Family
Creator Pahang Born in Kuantan, Malaysia in 1939, Redza Piyadasa was a Sinhalese whose grandparents came from Sri Lanka. He grew up in the east coast of Malay Peninsula. He was English-educated and fluent in Malay instead of Sinhalese. After completing his secondary education in 1956, he was admitted into Teachers' Training College, which provided him with an opportunity to study in the United Kingdom. There he developed an interest in art and history, two complementary disciplines that informed his intellectual artistic approach in the subsequent years.
He returned to Malaysia in 1959 and served as a teacher in Kuantan, until a fateful telephone call in 1963 from Syed Ahmad Jamal provided him with an opportunity to undertake specialized training in art. He was admitted into the Hornsey College of Art in London in the same year. It was a dynamic period of change, marked by transformation in the art education system that encouraged multidisciplinary approaches. He served once more as a teacher upon his return in 1967, but left for Kuala Lumpur soon after to teach at the newly-formed School of Art and Design at Institut Teknologi MARA (ITM)
In Kuala Limpur, he immediately became immersed into the art scene. It was a significant period of contemporary art development in Malaysia and Southeast Asia as practitioners across the region sought to develop newer perspectives of art and culture relevant to social or political contexts. For Piyadasa, the stage was set for him to stake his call for a transformation of artistic attitiudes and practices - from high modernism to conceptualism - whilst forging strong friendships and collaborations with Malaysia's most significant cultural practitioners of the time including Sulaiman Esa, Krishen Jit and Ismail Zain.1939Kuantan, Pahang, Malaysia2007Redza Piyadasa
DescriptionBaba Family belongs to Redza Piyadasa’s Malaysian Series which began in the early 1980s. In the series, Piyadasa makes silk screen prints from old photographic portraits of indigenous Malays and the multi-ethnic settlers of Malaysia, and re-works them with psychedelic colours and traditional fabric. In doing so, he personalises the past and surfaces issues of history, memory and identity.A found object, an old photograph of a baba's family, is silk-screen printed in triplicate in the manner of a film strip. It's very colourful image is attractive, but the real art content is the artist's concept and the mechanical process by which he produced his image. The artist provides the clues and expects the viewer to be more mentally and intellectually alert to transform what he sees into art. Piyadesa is a well known Malaysian art critic, painter and printmaker. He was trained in the U,K. and is a strong advocate of Conceptual Art.
Production placeMalaysia
Production date 1987 - 1987
Production period1987
DimensionsHeight: 140 cm
Length: 114 cm
