Chen Wen Hsi

Private Asian Collection

Singapore, National Museum Art Gallery, Chen Wen Hsi Retrospective 1982, Singapore, November 7-22-1982, Choy Weng Yang

Chang Tsong-Zung et al., Paintings by Chen Wen Hsi, The Old and New Gallery, Singapore, 1987, Colorplate W-15

Choy Weng Yang, Chen Wen Hsi, Retrospective 1982, International Press Singapore, 1982, Colorplate W-7

Chang Tsong-Zung et al., Paintings by Chen Wen Hsi, Grand Art Co. Ltd., 1991, Colorplate 16

The work is in good condition overall, as is the canvas, which is clear and taut. There is light wear and handling around the edges of the work, along with associated pin-sized paint losses on the middle of the right margin (navy paint). Examination under ultraviolet light shows restorations predominantly around the four borders. Framed.
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Chen Wen Hsi is celebrated for his transformative oeuvre that is a unique pairing of Chinese ink paintings together with Cubist, Fauvist, and Expressionist aesthetics. A member of the Nanyang group who originated in Singapore as part of the Chinese artists relocating to the country, the artist’s body of works ultimately redefined the public’s perception of what was deemed to be a successful marriage between Asian artistic principles with Western modes of expression. The present painting Fishing Village is a classic work from his oeuvre that seeks to present a brand new paradigm amidst the collapse of formal ideologies.

Contrary to his contemporaries, the artist moved to Singapore in 1948 for what promised to be a few months stay in the country. However Chen Wen Hsi discovered a wealth of artistic influences that would have a lasting impression upon his future artworks. Though well versed in classical Chinese painting and specializing in brush and ink works, he soon familiarized himself with “the clinical austerity of the Cubists, the sinister pathos of the Fauvists, [and] the violent anguish of the Expressionists…”¹. Artists including Paul Klee and Picasso played a key role in his Western art education. While these schools of thought may have been seen as disharmonious to a classically trained artist, for Chen Wen Hsi it was a welcoming shock that awoke within him new ways of re-strengthening his creative language.

“During those years of teaching and study, I gradually came to the realization of a basic concept in the art of painting, namely that what we are seeking in art is not just physical likeness of shape or form, but the composite image and spirit, the overall beauty and conclusion of the painting”, he said. “This leads me to the controversial subject of abstractionism, which has flourished especially after World War II, on account of an increasing tendency in man’s endeavours to seek mental and psychological freedom….Since the days of Goya, the tendency in Western art has consistently moved in the direction of shaping human thoughts free of physical bondage”².

This desire to challenge visual representation is evident in Fishing Village, for the oil painting is a cubist-inspired rendering of a typical seaside gathering found in Singapore. Favoured motifs throughout his career and notably in his oil paintings, Chen Wen Hsi’s portrayals of boats and fishing communities were gifted new life in the dynamic narratives, the fluid nature of the water and organized structures of the buildings redefined upon the canvases. Other paintings in his oeuvre, such as Houses Along the Boat Quay (Ref 1) are reflective of these chosen themes, and like the current piece, are reminiscent of the compositional layout and aesthetic found in George Braque’s painting Port en Normandie (Little Harbor in Normandy) (Ref 2).

Contrary to the notion that the ink on paper works did not share like themes found in the oil paintings, the artist’s portrayal of birds also demonstrated an early experimentation with Cubism. In works like Herons (Ref. 3) and Cranes (Ref. 4), the birds have been repositioned into a cubist-inspired composition, the minimalist color scheme embracing the Chinese saying to “paint the formless with form”³. It should be noted that the artist’s skills with brush and ink, when reformulated into oil paintings, shows his ability to adapt to differing mediums with equal merit.

Fishing Village continues in this vein of what is primarily the “analytical approaches to visible forms”⁴. Chen Wen Hsi’s collection of works fully embodies the ideology that “beauty in art is not dependent solely on feelings and sentiments [nor is it] regulated by reason and structure. In this sense, Abstract Art is one of the most pure and absolute [forms of] painting”⁵.

¹. Chang Tsong-Zung et al., Paintings by Chen Wen Hsi, The Old and New Gallery, Singapore, 1987.

².Choy Weng Yang, Chen Wen Hsi, Retrospective 1982, International Press Singapore, 1982.

³. Refer to 1.

⁴. Refer to 2.

⁵. Refer to 1.