Lot 012
SULAIMAN ESA
b. Johor, 1941
IN SEARCH OF THE PRIMORDIAL I, 2006;
IN SEARCH OF THE PRIMORDIAL II, 1990
Signed and dated ‘HE Sulaiman 2006’ (lower right);
signed and dated HE Sulaiman 1990’ (lower right)
Mixed media on paper
29cm x 40.5cm each (set of two)
PROVENANCE
Private collection, Johor.
LITERATURE
Paper, From The Periphery To The Centre: The Social Significance Of Sulaiman Esa’s Work From 1950s To 2007 (Prof. Madya Dr. Khatijah Sanusi, Ahmad Farid Raihan)
ESTIMATE RM 6,000 - 10,000
PRICE REALISED RM 6,720 |
It would be difficult to pinpoint, much less pin down, what Sulaiman Esa meant by the ‘Primordial.’ Primitive, aboriginal, indigenous or even further back to the creation of the world, perhaps as ‘late’ as post-colonial? One is left to speculate in his ‘Search of the Primordial’ from the little of graffiti of ideograms, khat calligraphy, cryptic symbols, ‘spiral of life’ motif, mock DNA sequencing, with visages of a man and a woman and a figure of undetermined sex thrown in for good measure. Clear is, from his Islamic-centrism and monotheism, Sulaiman Esa is after his 2001 Insyirah, exploring a ‘primordial’ state of religious mainsprings in various communities and the changes therein in each, apart from the anthropological fragmentations into different breakaway branches. His approach will be two-pronged, from the existing diversities and multiplicity of the religious groups, and the Western centric art discourse unattuned to Asian values and belief systems of time and space. But according to Sulaiman, the symbols are mytho-poetic visions that are non-objective, non-tangible, non-mimetic art operating in a non-Euclidean, non-perspectival space.
Sulaiman Esa is known for his Islamic Art phase and his 1974 ‘Towards A Mystical Reality’ (with Redza Piyadasa) Conceptual Art phase. Sulaiman had a Diploma in Art and Design at the Hornsey College of Art, London (1962-1966). He did post-graduate Printmaking at Sir William Hayter’s Atelier 17, Paris (1968). He achieved his MFA at the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore (1979-1981) and his PhD Islamic Studies at the Temple University, Philadelphia (1986-1996). He had lectured at the Universiti ITM since 1969 and was made Associate Professor in 1995. He won the Major Award in the ‘Man and his World’ competition organised by the National Art Gallery in 1973. His major exhibitions are ‘Insyirah: Works from 1980-2000’ (Galeri Petronas, KL, 2001); and ‘Rajah: Art, Idea and Creativity’ (1950-2011) retrospective at the NAG in 2011.
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