Lim Tze Peng

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About the artwork

This piece was painted right after his retirement in 1981. During this period, he had a strong urgency to paint the scenes of the disappearing kampongs and streets as they were soon to be demolished to make way for modernisation. Lim uses colours to emulate the essence of the olden days, capturing the energy of the hustle and bustle, transporting you back to the old Singapore. Lim makes good use of the space, and squeezes in as much detail as possible and also a clever play on negative space to truly give the viewers an authentic visual experience of how life was really like before modernisation and also to show just how rapidly things were changing.

About the artist

Born in Singapore in 1921, Lim Tze Peng is one of Singapore’s most significant artists and a living legend. Renowned for his Chinese ink creations of post-independence Singapore, he also practices Chinese calligraphy. Alongside local and international exhibitions, his masterpieces are exhibited in prominent Singapore institutions and part of many prestigious collections. Lim has been bestowed several awards including the Special Prize at the Commonwealth Art Exhibition in England in 1977 and the prestigious Cultural Medallion in Singapore in 2003. In May 2012, he broke records with the sale of his works at a Christies auction in Hong Kong.