4 Curatorial Remarks Visual language is a universal language being the key to the knowledge of science communication. It is a vehicle to passing knowledge, interaction between human being and advancement to life quality improvement. The process of producing art may look easy to some people. However, to those who are involved in the making of art knew that it took very long hours, days, months and sometimes years to produce good arts. No doubt it is tiring but the result of a good piece of art is worth the effort. High spirit and strong belief in what you do are the secrets to staying long in this industry and be able to produce excellent and high quality art. “The artist is a receptacle for the emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.”- Pablo Picasso. A good art is the expression of its creator. The artist should make art from love, sensitivity, desire, responsibility, likes, dislikes, anger or inner expression that has lost words but are anxious to come out from the artist’s mind. The latest of <strong>Suzlee</strong>’s work clearly walks towards these aggressive and wild feelings of expressions. The Monsoon Series (2009) is an advancement of a short experimental work entitled the Ombak Series (Wave Series) in 2007. Both series started after the very long year of Movement Series, which started in 1995 – 2005. In the Movement Series, the action involved the psychomotor skills of the artist’s mobility. The brushes and painting tools moved and danced on the canvas with the artist’s instinct and mood experiencing nature. In both Ombak and Monsoon Series, his experience with the wilderness of the Monsoon season becomes the drive to initiate actions. <strong>Suzlee</strong> was born and brought up in Kuala Terengganu, in the east coast of the Peninsular of Malaysia. The east coast receives massive rain towards the end of the year due to the Monsoon season. When he was small and at a tender age, he witnessed the pain and struggles of the ‘kampong’ people whom many were rubber tappers, farmers and fishermen survived the season. It is a season that keeps sad, sad stories of kampong people that sheltered underneath roofs made of leaves and wooden houses. Their agony, their worries and pains do not receive any sympathies from the fierce winds that blow down the kampong or heavy rain that drowns the land. The memory of the heavy rain and harsh seas of the monsoon season have inspired <strong>Suzlee</strong> to paint the new series named the Monsoon Series. Still, without concentrating on any images, he expressed complex brush strokes, textures and skilled composition using limited colours on the canvases, producing purely abstract expressionist -‘action paintings’. For the past 20 years, both acrylic and oil are the two main medium used on canvases for his all paintings. Although both Ombak and Monsoon Series are his memories of the seas in his hometown, Ombak Series paintings have a different mood. It is less aggressive in its presentation and uses vibrant colours as highlights. The Monsoon Series focuses on dark, murky weather of the monsoon season and strong waves and currents made from strong winds. These are shown in the use of limited secondary colours and fast, strong strokes on the canvases. <strong>Suzlee</strong> is not new in the Malaysian art scene. This exhibition is <strong>Suzlee</strong>’s 16th solo exhibition. <strong>Suzlee</strong> obtained his art education from the Institute of Technology MARA, Shah Alam (1987) in fine arts. He has exhibited his works in more than five hundred group exhibitions, local and overseas such as the United Kingdom, USA, Denmark, Germany, France, Belgium, Italy, Brazil, Cuba, Spain, Canada, China, Japan, Argentina, Greece, Poland, UAE, Australia, Bangladesh and Nepal. Among the collectors of his artworks from the previous series are Balai Seni Lukis Negara (Movement Series, Highgrove, 2001), Bank Negara (Movement Series, Tulip 1, 2004) and EMAAR Properties, Dubai, UAE (Space Series, Construction 4,2005) and Lautan Biru – 2005 from the last of Movement Series is the collection of His Majesty The Yang Di-Pertuan Agong Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin. For this exhibition, <strong>Suzlee</strong> specially presented 27 pieces of the best of Monsoon Series displayed at the PinkGuy Gallery, Kuala Lumpur. It is <strong>Suzlee</strong>’s main objective to let Pinkguy Gallery as his representative to the new and definitely exclusive arts for serious collectors and art enthusiasts. <strong>PINKGUY</strong>
<strong>Suzlee</strong> <strong>Ibrahim</strong> I started painting seriously since 1987, while studying at the Institute of Technology MARA, Shah Alam. For 20 years, I work on to become abstract painter, and where I am now, my effort definitely pays off. Lecturer Faculty of Fine Art Akademi Seni Budaya Dan Warisan Kebangsaan MALAYSIA W http://www.suzleefineart.paint.at E mrsuzlee@hotmail.com 5
Change language