Lot 029
Khaw Sia
b. China, 1913 - d. 1984
Bali Padi Field, 1982
signed and dated ‘K.SIA. 1982.’ (lower left)
with one seal of the artist
acrylic on canvas
62 x 89cm
PROVENANCE
Private collection, Kuala Lumpur
ESTIMATE RM 11,000 – 19,000
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Khaw Sia first went to Bali, Indonesia, in 1954, after the much ballyhooed 1952 field trip to Bali by the Singaporean Big Four, namely Cheong Soo-Pieng, Chen Wen-hsi, Chen Chong Swee and Liu Kang. This work, with Mount Agong in the backdrop, is dated 1982, and it is not certain if the flamboyant artist did it from memory or had visited the place again before the work. Khaw Sia’s first solo in Penang, on his coming-over to Malaya in 1937, was of Balinese women and landscape.
Trained at the Sin Hwa Art Academy in Shanghai in 1925-32, Khaw Sia came under the informal coaching of Sir Russel Flintin London in 1933. He was given a posthumous retrospective by the Penang State Art Gallery in 1998. As indication of his expertise and stature, his works were accepted by the Le Salon Paris in 1956, Summer Salon at the Royal Institute Galleries in London in 1957, and National Society Exhibition in London in 1958. |