.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Rimba
Nafasmu: Baramalan
Jariku: Angin yang keruh
Kau terjaga
Setiap lapis kulitmu membuka
Bila bibirmu kusentuh
Rimba
Kau serumpun lalang
Di padang pasir
Akulah kekasihmu
Akulah yang mendesir
Rimba
Warna hampas dari benua yang kutinggalkan
Bersuaralah keras-keras
Hempaskan sepimu
Ke dadaku
Rimba
Your breath: Night-embers
My fingers: The troubled wind
You wake up
Opening each layer of your skin
Each time I touch your wound
Rimba
A cluster of lalang
In the dried up land
I am your lover
I am the one that rustles
Rimba
Pale pulp of forgotten continent
Keep on howling
Fling back your solitude
To my breast
(Latiff Mohidin, 1974)
Painter, sculptor, printmaker, poet - Latiff Mohidin's accomplishments as an artist across genres and styles is a testament to his place as one of the forerunners of modern Malaysian art.
A student at the Academy of Fine Art in Berlin, Germany, and having been exposed to the development of abstraction and expressionism in Europe and North America, Mohidin's art bears referents of the bold colours, distorted forms, flat perspectives and psychological dimension of Berlin expressionism (Fig. 1). Mohidin's long artistic career is often conceptualized into successive and overlapping series of works - beginning with the Pago-Pago series in the mid-60s focusing on powerful expressionist renderings of the monumental stupas found in Southeast Asia. The 70s saw Mohidin move on to the Mindscape series of abstract works, and subsequently the Gelombang series in the 80s, based on the energy and movement of waves. Mohidin's conception of different series in his works is founded on a desire to continuously push himself to explore new ideas and techniques on the canvas. The series are not distinct, but often emerge organically as a product of his artistic process. Mohidin often moves backwards and forwards across his practice - revisiting old ideas, and re-expressing them with new emotion and vigor. The commonality across his works can be understood as a constant contemplation of man's relationship with nature, and of nature's overwhelming and all-encompassing power.
The first work bearing the title Rimba was produced in 1991, and can be translated from Malay to mean a primeval forest (Fig. 3). Mohidin's forests are far from idealized pastoral utopias, and are instead densely composed, with little or no breathing space - compact and rendered with frenetic energy.
A supremely talented writer and poet, Mohidin has expressed his idea of the forest as such: "There is a sort of merging into a string - network of various sorts of silks and thread and hairs of leaves, barks among the crusts of moss. All seem to have gathered for a meeting in the sizzling dialects of Nature from various districts of the jungle - which lush [sic] under the pouring tropical rain." (Latiff Mohidin in Rimba Series, Galerie Petronas, Malaysia, 1998, p. 16).
Mohidin's evocative exposition is made tangible in Selumbar: Kulit Kayu (Splinters: Barks) (Lot 64), where the energy and history contained within the splintering of tree bark comes to the fore. The overlapping layers of paint defy a single point of origin, and reach out from all directions of the canvas. There is an underlying vitality present here, and a sense of interconnection and regeneration. The complexity of Mohidin's psyche is perhaps best expressed through his poetic writings in the below poem, written in 1974, and later expressed to striking visual effect in the Rimba series.
Nafasmu: Baramalan
Jariku: Angin yang keruh
Kau terjaga
Setiap lapis kulitmu membuka
Bila bibirmu kusentuh
Rimba
Kau serumpun lalang
Di padang pasir
Akulah kekasihmu
Akulah yang mendesir
Rimba
Warna hampas dari benua yang kutinggalkan
Bersuaralah keras-keras
Hempaskan sepimu
Ke dadaku
Rimba
Your breath: Night-embers
My fingers: The troubled wind
You wake up
Opening each layer of your skin
Each time I touch your wound
Rimba
A cluster of lalang
In the dried up land
I am your lover
I am the one that rustles
Rimba
Pale pulp of forgotten continent
Keep on howling
Fling back your solitude
To my breast
(Latiff Mohidin, 1974)
Painter, sculptor, printmaker, poet - Latiff Mohidin's accomplishments as an artist across genres and styles is a testament to his place as one of the forerunners of modern Malaysian art.
A student at the Academy of Fine Art in Berlin, Germany, and having been exposed to the development of abstraction and expressionism in Europe and North America, Mohidin's art bears referents of the bold colours, distorted forms, flat perspectives and psychological dimension of Berlin expressionism (Fig. 1). Mohidin's long artistic career is often conceptualized into successive and overlapping series of works - beginning with the Pago-Pago series in the mid-60s focusing on powerful expressionist renderings of the monumental stupas found in Southeast Asia. The 70s saw Mohidin move on to the Mindscape series of abstract works, and subsequently the Gelombang series in the 80s, based on the energy and movement of waves. Mohidin's conception of different series in his works is founded on a desire to continuously push himself to explore new ideas and techniques on the canvas. The series are not distinct, but often emerge organically as a product of his artistic process. Mohidin often moves backwards and forwards across his practice - revisiting old ideas, and re-expressing them with new emotion and vigor. The commonality across his works can be understood as a constant contemplation of man's relationship with nature, and of nature's overwhelming and all-encompassing power.
The first work bearing the title Rimba was produced in 1991, and can be translated from Malay to mean a primeval forest (Fig. 3). Mohidin's forests are far from idealized pastoral utopias, and are instead densely composed, with little or no breathing space - compact and rendered with frenetic energy.
A supremely talented writer and poet, Mohidin has expressed his idea of the forest as such: "There is a sort of merging into a string - network of various sorts of silks and thread and hairs of leaves, barks among the crusts of moss. All seem to have gathered for a meeting in the sizzling dialects of Nature from various districts of the jungle - which lush [sic] under the pouring tropical rain." (Latiff Mohidin in Rimba Series, Galerie Petronas, Malaysia, 1998, p. 16).
Mohidin's evocative exposition is made tangible in Selumbar: Kulit Kayu (Splinters: Barks) (Lot 64), where the energy and history contained within the splintering of tree bark comes to the fore. The overlapping layers of paint defy a single point of origin, and reach out from all directions of the canvas. There is an underlying vitality present here, and a sense of interconnection and regeneration. The complexity of Mohidin's psyche is perhaps best expressed through his poetic writings in the below poem, written in 1974, and later expressed to striking visual effect in the Rimba series.