Lot 106
ANTHONIE CHONG
b. Perak, 1971
GATHERING III, 1998
Signed and dated ‘a. Chong 98’ on the reverse
Oil on canvas
127cm x 142cm
PROVENANCE
Private collection, Kuala Lumpur.
ESTIMATE RM 18,000 - 32,000
PRICE REALISED RM 24,640.00 |
It’s an innocuous image of three nubile girls apparently in stripe uniform playing in front of a building, a school? The one with the hair tied in a horsetail and in red fluttering skirt is skipping down the wide steps towards the two seated in front, both holding something in their hands, one raising it with both hands. Knowing Anthonie Chong with his habit of conveying underlying tensions in his figures, this is not a happy rendition of girls at play with all the innocence, but has some sexual and disturbing overtones, in the mind of the voyeur – the artist, you and I. Or could it be something more sobering, the ‘Trinity’ referred to in his first one-man show at Valentine Willie Fine Art, Kuala Lumpur, in July 1997.
Anthonie Chong graduated in Graphic Design from the Perak Institute of Art in 1991. He won the Philip Morris Asean Art Award, Malaysia in 1998. In 2000, he switched to caricature-like iconography fusing eastern surrealism with digital technology, namely his e-monk creations which morphed into @-monk in 2010, which was represented in three series – Community, Gaia and Mechanism. He had his first solo at the X Pub and Gallery in Penang in 1974. He had worked as an art teacher (Art Design, Kuala Lumpur), graphic designer, illustrator and lecturer at Art Direction (1992-1995), before helping out a relative in his business.
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