Response

This artwork stood up in stark contrast -- the roughness of the ink strokes, the paper, worn and tattered, stood out from the considerably more ‘refined’ pieces in the gallery. This difference made it feel more real to us somehow, as if there was something deeper hidden beneath every stroke. Of course, art is often made with a goal in mind, no matter the medium or way of presentation, and the way the artist chose such a way of presentation was for a reason. Hence we decided to analyse this very art piece, because of its difference, and its relatability. As students, what we create isn’t perfect, and yet as this raw, rough piece shows, there is still meaning in it, and so we chose it, because we felt that Random Blends is precisely that -- learning along the way, not being perfect all the time, and yet ultimately, being able to put up something meaningful.

The subject matter of this piece drew our attention as well; people just living their day-to-day lives, unaware of being sketched into immortality by an artist at that very moment. The capturing of what appears to be simple moments point towards what we had been thinking about the spaces assignment -- seemingly normal spaces holding deeper meanings. Perhaps these figures were strategically placed together for a reason, that the space of the paper holds some form of meaning.

At first glance, we felt a sense of familiarity to the artwork, as they were images similar to the depictions of Singapore’s history in our texts and collection of artwork. There were people in straw hats, sitting on stools and most of them were squatting down. Looking further at this work, we realised that these 3 pictures are connected, because of how it was placed together as a series of sketches. However, we later realised that this artwork, while familiar, felt a little distant. The people in this artwork were all segregated, although they were on the same canvas. As much as they were distant from one another in this small space, we felt distant from the artwork as that was not the mainstream understanding of Singapore’s history.

Description

The subject matter is observations of different groups of people.

We notice that the artist chose to compose the art piece by placing each individual at its own space. He also composed it in a way where mostly every individual in the art piece was facing in different directions, where no two individuals faced each other. The individuals that weren’t standing/sitting together (such as the two elderly women with their bags of shopping) were often drawn as not looking at each other.

The artist decided to present his work in the form of line art, through the medium of paper and pen. He uses what appears to be a piece of heavyweight paper, and simply sketches with fine liner pens. The pieces of paper are torn and slightly crumpled. The pieces are framed up in simple white frames with a plain white backing.

The size/scale of each individual is relatively small as compared to the composition. Instead of drawing focus to a certain individual, each are mostly the same size, focusing attention equally.

We notice that the artist repeated certain shapes like circles and straight lines to create patterns. When drawing people, the lines are imperfect, showcasing the organic nature of the human body.

The first artwork in the series utilizes horizontal axis while the other two utilizes the vertical axis. The artwork is presented in a two-dimensional space, with no forms of shading to create volume in the subjects.

For this series, the artist used a monochromatic colour scheme, using black which contrasts against the pale colour of the paper.

Analysis and Interpretation

The work seems to be focused on the subject of separation, perhaps racial, perhaps even among people belonging to the same race (i.e. dialect groups). In the series of artwork, we see people in various positions, often sleeping. Those who are in groups as well, are mostly not facing each other, but looking in other directions. In the artwork, the people are segregated from each other, further signifying some sort of distance between the different individuals. Even among individuals who are portrayed side-by-side and thus assuming they know each other, they are not looking at each other. This emphasises even a distance between people who know each other. The subjects in his art are relatively the same size -- perhaps he wanted to highlight how they were of equal classes and standing, and yet a distance exists between them as shown in the sketch. Aside from the segregation, we are also shown people involved in several activities. Even though we are part of a multiracial society today, we can see that people from different communities tend to participate in different activities.

From this, we can interpret that he was trying to communicate the feelings of isolation among the people living in Singapore at that period of time. Despite Singapore being a relatively small red dot, and people being in close proximity to each other, he seems to be emphasising and showing the loneliness that occurs even in a group. This idea could have been related to the issues plaguing Singapore at that time, with a new nation discovering her own identity as well as her people of all races and religions trying to get along. At that time, racial tensions were high, and even it was difficult for people living together in a new nation, not knowing what lies in the future.

The rough sketches and nature of the paper seem to imply this sort of ‘natural’ feel and spontaneity in his work. It is as if he went around Singapore, sketching the people he saw around. Therefore, it is possible that he chose such a way of presenting his work to show that this art is a result of natural observations, an immortalising of the people of that time on a permanent medium. To further support this, in the third piece in the series, he even seems to have sketched himself, as shown by the drawing of an artist on the left sketching the old man sleeping, with lines seemingly to represent the transfer of real life to his paper. This emphasises his objective of sending the message that this isolation and separation was what the scene of Singapore at that time was like.

Evaluation and Judgement

We feel that the image has been rather effective in accomplishing “its” intentions, through the usage of empty spaces to depict distance and segregation among individuals. As mentioned earlier, the choice of medium and style also effectively convey the feeling that the work was a result of real life observations of people at that time. Through this, it more strongly convinces us that this piece of work can be taken as a ‘snapshot’ into that point in time, that it is a trustworthy, realistic depiction of how Singaporean society was at that period of time. Even more so, for a ‘rough-looking’ artwork such as this, for it to have enough significance to be chosen to be displayed in a museum among other arguably more ‘complete-looking’ works, draws our attention to closer scrutiny to it and looking under the surface, and in this aspect, it has worked well visually. This also brings us back to the point of an accurate depiction of society -- many societies can look perfect on the surface, but look deeper and we see the flaws and loneliness among its people. And it is exactly this flaws and loneliness that he seems to be emphasising.

We felt that the artist could have injected more visual cues to provide more details about the people that he was drawing such as their race or nationality. However, that could be a reason as to why the individuals in the art works seem to be mostly Chinese, as Harry Chin Chun Wah’s old works were mostly based on Singapore’s old streets such as Chinatown and Singapore River. Being places where most Chinese in Singapore congregated at, this could be the artist’s portrayal of what he sees in Singapore, frequenting these places. While all three artworks show a hint of “distance” between individuals, the artwork in the centre shows a noticeable addition of a Singh, a different racial group from the rest who are ambiguously drawn, seemingly Chinese. One reason could be the fact that this artwork is the most recent of the three, dated in 1972. The understanding of the artist helped us understand his artwork better, as it tells us why the artwork was done in such a way, mostly due to the places he went to, and as a result the things he saw, which in turn became the artwork that we see today.

After all this critique and analysis, we felt that our first response has intensified. Initially, when looking at it, we felt a distance and a sense of isolation from the white spaces and contrasting black and white scheme that the artist used. Looking more closely at it and trying to figure out what it could mean, this sense of loneliness conveyed in the work has intensified what we felt as well.

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