Another of my Earliest Sculptures

I did this also at my extra-mural part-time class in 2003. This should be the second sculpture I ever did in class. It is a portrait sculpture, life-size. The material is cement reinforced with some fiberglass, hollow.

Looking back, I think the teacher/instructor make too big a jump in the way he progressed from the first to the second sculpture. At this second sculpture there were so many new sculpture techniques to learn. But I did manage the given task with just a slightly broken tip of the nose.

We followed a solid teaching model with muscles exposed and one eye closed.

My First Artwork in Class

The above picture should be the very first artworks that I did in class. It was dated July 2003. This was when I was finishing my semi-retirement at the university NTU. I was doing doing it at the NAFA sculpture workshop at their old Upper Wilkie Road campus. I think it was at an Extra-Mural Class on 'Portrait Sculpture' taught by their part-time staff Chang Wei.

I was learning the first steps of sculpting. We learnt about bas relief sculpting with wet clay, then about mixing water into plaster and pouring it to make a one-piece plaster mould. Next after applying separator we poured a plaster cast, and finally painting.

The Style of My Artworks

When I was going into sculptures, I did quite a bit of exploration into different styles and different materials. Some of these exploratory items are still on my shelves.

I submitted some of them into the Annual 3D Art Exhibitions of the Ngee Ann Cultural Centre at Tank Road. Among those I submitted, although there were a variety of styles, I was drifting towards creative artworks that are figurative and express strong emotions. They were not large as, perhaps for their practical reasons, these Exhibitions had to impose limitations on the size and weight of the artworks.

Subsequently I was honoured to be sponsored by this Ngee Ann Cultural Center (NACC) to hold a solo exhibition in May 2007. For this exhibition, the styles of my artworks were creative, figurative, expressing emotions, and with something to communicate. They are not necessarily stand-alone sculptures. The general term for some of them is installations. Doing installations allow the artist to have more freedom which is a necessary condition to be creative.

The Exhibition Hall is big. Thus some of my artworks could be big. There is now no size limitations other than the ceiling height. But to get more freedom from height limitation, some of my artwork were placed ourside the exhibition hall.

For this exhibition, I gave the title, "Our World Today". My focus was on humanity around the world. As many viewers may not know the background to what the artworks are expressing, to each of them I add a relatively long write-up to explain.

After this exhibition, I slowed down in the making of statues but continued to make installations making use of mostly of plastics boards very much becuae as they are not too heavy. These are again based on the human figure.

At the same time, I started to explore doing oil paintings. By then it is clear I focus on the realism style of paintings, many of them figurative but not all.

Then I got news I was sponsored a second time by the Ngee Ann Cultural Centre to hold a solo exhibition. This was held recently in October 2009, called "Our Changing World".

Thus in terms of contents, they continue to be about topical issues, events and people around our world. My artwork style continues to be the same.

I am surrounding by my paintings

For the time being, I've finished hanging up my paintings, both along my staircase and in a room upstair. As my wall space is limited, the paintings are crowded together all over the walls.

These paintings were mostly painted for my large solo exhibition in October 2009 with the theme 'Our Changing World'. Thus they are mostly on topical issues, events and people from around the world. Their style is realism, many of them figurative.

When I walk up and down the staircase and through this room to take a short cut to my study room, I feel surrounded by thing to do with our world.

To show what I mean, I have taken a video of these hung up paintings, and have loaded it into YouTube. It is here, duration 9 min. Oil Paintings on 'Our Changing World'

I cleared an upstair room to hang more paintings

By now my staircase is filled up with paintings, crowding against each other. The extra lightings have also been adjusted and improved.

But as I still have paintings to hang up, I decided to clear up one of my extra room upstair on top of the staircase. It was once a guest bedroom subsequently used for storage. The wall spaces on two sides can be used to hang paintings.

I thus clear off the things inside, some to be thrown away, some are put aside to give away, and the rest are moved into a smaller room next to the room I want to clear. This clearing is easily said than done. I keep being distracted by the old things I have to deal with.

Among the paintings I have to hang up, six of them are not on canvas. They are on plastics panels, each of size 2 x 4 ft. They are heavier than stretched canvas, hung not at the centre but at the two ends. They really gave me problem hanging up by myself. Once I had to call for an extra pair of hands to help.

I've now hung up all my paintings that deserve displaying, and have installed extra lighting in this upstair room.

Perhaps I'll do a retake of a video of the staircase and add on this room.

I get more active in Facebook

I am now quite active in Facebook. Initially I joined to network with artists. Some are with the online art forum which I have been active, and the others are their friends.

I spend time trying to get familiar with FB, especially with their privacy settings. The trouble is that FB has special terminology. It looks simple but is actually quite complex. They have to be complex as they have to cater for more than 300 million users each with their own interests when they network.

FB keep encouraging us to link up with more friends. This is their successful business model. They provide a free site and rely on income from adverts in their pages. The more users they get, the more businesses are willing to pay to put adverts there.

Gradually I notice other friends also using FB and I link up with them. Some are old classmates, and some are relatives. This is where the situation gets more complex. This I like to show or talk about to do with art are not of interest to others.

Fortunately a few artist friends are helpful and guide me on how to separate the conversations into groups of friends. But sometimes I forget.

In general, for networking with artists, FB has its pros and cons compared with online art forums. I notice so far in FB I cannot get in-depth discussions with artist friends. It is not designed for longer comments. After a while, the line of discussions gets buried and does not rise to thet top with new comments.

FB has fan page for more in-depth comments. But the comments are limited to friends who link to the fan page.

On the other hand, the amount of interest in online art forums seem to be reducing and artists are drifting to FB.

Camcorder & Facebook

I have not been using this pocket size camcorder to record videos to put into YouTube. For this purpose I'm still using the borrowed camcorder. But as one day my friend may want it back for his own use, I may have to buy a proper one for myself.

I have been pursuing another activity related to art. I have joined Facebook to connect to my art friends. It is a complex e-platform and takes time to get familiar. By now I am a bit better using it and adding as 'friends' more artists I knew, and others that I previously didn't know. I also managed to search for and connect with some local art friends.

But Facebook is for networking with any friends. Gradually I have made connections with say some relatives, old friends that are not artists, old colleagues, classmates, etc.

One problem is that when I post something to artists, this also appears at the FB page of other friends. Many of these art postings are not really of interest to others. I'll have to see how to be selective in sending out my postings.