Lot 044
JUSTIN LIM
b. Kuala Lumpur, 1983
UNTITLED, 2011
Acrylic on canvas and silkscreen print on perspex box
60cm x 52cm
PROVENANCE
Private collection, Singapore.
ESTIMATE RM 4,000 - 5,000
PRICE REALISED RM 4,950 |
A well-recognised young Malaysian artist, Justin Lim has risen up the ranks to establish himself among the edgier artists in Malaysia. He tackles current and social issues that cover religion, politics and culture in unconventional ways. This lot on offer is an intriguing mixed-media piece; a canvas filled with a spectrum of colours, painted with acrylic in the manner of Pointillism, encased in a Perspex box with a silkscreened image of a skull on the forefront. A multi-layered icon which has been much exploited by the super nova of art-sell Damien Hirst, the skull takes centre stage here like a landscape. Justin, like Hirst, is concerned about what had lapsed to be a pirate’s badge to something full of religious symbolisms and issues of existence. The screen-printing on perspex technique was developed since Justin Lim’s 2010 solo, Secret Identities. In the catalogue of the exhibition Garden of Hidden Desires at the Wei Ling Contemporary in Kuala Lumpur in 2008, he was quoted as saying: “A painting is at times like an altar or a shrine. It can be celebrated, worshipped or even ridiculed. The cult imagery creates a dialogue between the idea of belief systems entwined with popular culture, and its relevance in our contemporary social context.”
Artist-musician Justin Lim graduated with a Diploma in Visual and Digital Art from Limkokwing University of Creative Technology in 2003. He did his Post-graduate studies with a Master of Art (Fine Art) by The Open University, UK conducted at LaSalle-SIA College of the Arts, Singapore in 2006. He was selected for the Taksu Art-Residency Programme (TARP) in 2007, and the 2008 Rimbun Dahan artist’s residency which resulted in the exhibition Gods, Heroes & Myths. He represented Malaysia at the Asian Biennale in Taiwan in 2009 and the Asian Artist Fellowship at the Vermont Studio Centre in 2011. He was also selected for the 2012 Khazanah Nasional Artist Residency hosted by Red Gate Gallery in Beijing, China.
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