WANTED: Someone to restore Arteri and give it 2nd life. Interested? Email: mail.sharonchin.com
In 2004, I enrolled in the Master of Visual Art (MVA) program at University Malaya. My offer letter stated that my academic supervisor is Redza Piyadasa. Having come back to Malaysia recently, I was extremely naïve and ignorant of local art history, wondering who this person is. Our meeting resulted in my switch from a full time research program to a coursework and dissertation program of study. Piya (as he is known in the visual art fraternity) reasoned that I was a studio artist without sufficient grounding on regional art history. He also gave assurances that it would be an intellectually stimulating and invigorating program. Though skeptical, I decided to follow his advice. From November of that year, I embarked on a journey of intensive study with this man. The requirements of the program state that we are to complete eight coursework modules prior to the start of our thesis writing. Piya single-handedly created my love for Southeast Asian Art History.
My initial indifference for regional art history stemmed from my undergraduate days. Certain art schools (studio based) then and now only instructed their students in the tenets of Western Art History. I am not implying that Western Art History is not important; I am suggesting that as tertiary art students in the region, Southeast Asian Art History is imperative to the understanding of who we are and the position we stand as practitioners based in the region. Piya always said that we should not look at ourselves as Malaysians but Southeast Asians.
Coming back to the MVA, Piya taught me Southeast Asian Art 1 and 2, Graduate Seminar on Art Critical Writing and Modern Southeast Asian Art. I attended the course with a handful of others with a one-to-one for a particular module. Little did I realize that we would be among the last of his students. His lecturers were highly intense, dramatic and absorbing. There was never a dull moment. He epitomized what people today refer to as ‘old school’. Piya did not use slides on projector nor power point presentations. In this age of advance technology, he plucked images from books or drew on the white board. Hand-outs were in the form of articles and features to be read in advance for the following week. In every lecture, we scribbled hard copying his oratory instruction. His encyclopedic knowledge, understanding and passion never ceased to amaze me. At times, he would ask where we stopped previously and continued from there. Classes of 2 hours stretched to 3 then 4 hours. I vividly remember a particular situation when the electricity was cut off halfway through the lecture. He continued talking; saying nonchalantly that the current would come back in a bit. It was a good 45 minutes before we could see each other clearly again!
Assignments were 20 or 30 page reports of a specific topic. Each of us researched into different areas so that we would have a wider frame of understanding when we read each other’s work. Our discourse did not end in the lectures or in his office. On the numerous occasions he welcomed me to his home, I spent much of my time reading and listening to him. This father-like-figure loaned me his books and piled on more every time we met at his residence. Eventually, a significant amount of his didactic efforts were drilled into this thick skull of mine. By this time, I realized that the more I read, the less I know.
The whole idea of sharing my thoughts here was in part due to Sharon and Simon. Two weeks ago, they sent me mails, though each was not aware of the other doing so. The former wanted to know about my experiences at the postgraduate level, while the latter was interested in the program at the university. Here it is guys. However, I have not iterated on all the issues.
At this point, I would like to extend my take on fine art education in Malaysia. Most of us are aware of the number of artists being churned out by institutions like UiTM, MIA and other private colleges. Let us not forget the graduates returning from foreign art schools. No doubt, we have artists aplenty. My question is the number of formally trained art historians and curators-writers (as June says) we have in Malaysia. To look at things in perspective, how many museums and galleries do we have in the country or in Klang Valley alone? I am discounting the so-called frame shops doubling up as art galleries. In fact, there are more private and commercial galleries mushrooming as I write. For a long time now, people have been saying that we do not have sufficient writing and publications on Malaysian art. I am aware that this is an old debate. Well, do we have programs on Art History and Curatorial Studies to meet the demand? Let us look a little further, as Piya said, to Southeast Asia. How many institutions offer such a program to cater to the need of curatorial and scholarship purposes? Not to be sour grapes here, not everyone can afford nor are they presented with the opportunity to pursue further studies in the United States, Europe or Australia for that matter.
In recent years, public universities have been put to task for what else, ranking. This has resulted in certain institutions being projected as research universities. My hypothesis of a university receiving research status means less coursework and more research. The objective is of course to elevate our public university rankings in the world. I have been teaching at the tertiary level for a number of years. Being a product of the local national education system myself, I am suggesting that many of our students are not taught to think and write critically. To make matters worse, many do not even enjoy history as a subject. Would it be mean to say that students are in fact more adept in the art of “memorizing” to achieve their string of A’s in public examinations?
Perhaps what I am suggesting here is the dire need for a tertiary program that provides a better leverage of coursework and research in the promotion of Southeast Asian Art History and Curatorial Studies. What about a program and syllabus that reflects our current education system to cater to the industrial needs? In April this year, I was in Singapore to attend a talk by art historian T.K. Sabapathy. Entitled ‘Road to Nowhere’, it was attended by members of the artistic community on the other side of the causeway. Interestingly, it gave me an opportunity to understand the advancement or non-advancement of art history studies in Singapore. But then that is another story.
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Kelvin Chuah wears many hats as artist, writer, curator and lecturer. He is interested in Southeast Asian art history, specifically contemporary art produced in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and the Philippines.
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Perhaps in the similar spirit that Piya saw that we should see ourselves as Southeast Asians, I would prefer a more generalist approach in art education and encourage the development of cultural or media studies. Art history is too closely associated with the tradition of building an ineccessible world of high culture. Transdisciplinary studies is the best way to make sense of this hyperfracturized reality.
Hello Zonk,
Art history is too closely associated with the tradition of building an ineccessible world of high culture.
Maybe it is, but that’s not entirely true. My art history education was a solid balance between visual/cultural studies and art historical skill. The skill set you learn from art history, such as the methodology for close-reading is something you don’t normally get from media studies, which I think is just as important.
It’s true that art history is often seen as this very stuff discipline and I don’t deny some lecturers can be like that. But my experiences of studying modern + contemporary art modules prove otherwise. And it is helpful too, if in the course of one’s study, that one can train a critical eye on the various theoretical framework that trans-disciplinary studies aspire towards.
On another note, it’s interesting that the kind of Southeast Asian consciousness is most prevalent in Malaysia amongst all the countries in this region. I previously though it was only limited to the gallery I used to work in, but I guess Piya must be one of the pioneers in this movement. Not to mention that Malaysian collectors are some of the earliest that embrace contemporary art in Southeast Asia. For this, they need to be commended for their open-ness.
Hello Simon :)
In good foreign universities, there are plenty of opportunities to counterbalance specialist knowledge with generalist courses.
I guess was thinking about art education at a local level. The problems Kevin mentions at uni level starts way back in our overcrowded kindergardens but I think what would be feasible dream is a visual/media/cultural studies component in our highschool syllabus. Unless we can include the analysis of advertising in Art History classes, the subject can be left to Sekolah Sri X or Y.
Currently I think the art history section of the PMR art syllabus simply has some tokoh-tokoh seni whose work they will hardly ever get the chance to see or own. Thus contributing to the sense that art and culture is something distanced from their life when in fact the video games, television programs, websites, and advertising that awash the eyes of youths everyday are similar in power to the artistic decorations of gothic cathedrals and the monumental paintings in museums.
Kids need to learn how to critically ‘read’ and manage the barage of visual stimulus inorder to become smarter consumers and more savvy citizens. As much as I hate to say it, learning to ‘appreciate’ the traditional arts is more of a ‘bonus’, not an urgent need.
Dear zonk and simon,
thanks for your comments. I would accede that visual culture and media studies is important in today’s society. However, liberal studies may not be a forte in our art education. Hence, the whole idea of placing art history as a basis is to perhaps create a solid grounding for the students. Furthermore, aren’t there efforts now to “debunk” this notion of high art? to make art more accessible and approachable to the masses. What do you reckon?
Hello Kelvin,
Isn’t art history and cultural/visual/media studies part of the liberal arts? And I don’t think there’s much effort to debunk the notion of high art going on. Capitalist societies reap a lot of profit by promoting the idea of uniqueness and exclusivity. Those who see art as a free concept that is without a position of high and low are just a minority of dirty hippies.
So ok. Lets put media/visual/cultural studies aside and think of realistic scenarious for promoting art history.
I guess the most realitic thing in the long term would be to integrate the study of artistic artefacts into our present school history module.
Facts/text base understanding of history is what kills it most of the time for youths. Using pretty pictures might be a simple way of hooking them.
Since reproduction costs have gone down, our archives, museums and galleries should provide uncopyrighted and digitalized images of their best ‘stuff’ to history text books publishers. The choices should be based on relevant chapters in the school syllabus. For example: British colonialisation pages could include watercolours from the British while Malaysia’s modern history could incorporate examples of modern art.
The impetous for such a move could come from our Balai’s education/ public outreach department corporating with the national archive or other bodies.
As a starter, maybe the visuals from the Balai Timeline collection could be adjusted to create a site targeted at highschool or primary school students.
A another idea for growing art history and Malaysian culture would be to just make bigger chunks of the Malaysian Encyclopedia available online for free (what’s available now is pathetic).
For a small percentage of the cost of bringing down F1 cars and foreign football players or sending Malaysians to space, big malaysian corporations and the government could have been giving Malaysians access to their cultural heritage and thus real reasons for calling this country their home.
PS Did Piya have an image bank and is anyone digitalizing it?
Dear Zonk,
Couldn’t have put it better myself. Kudos!!
Piya unfortunately, do not have an image bank. Hmm… his works being scattered as it is, should be quite a task to put it together. But then again, I reckon that his remembrance show at petronas is a good place to start.
Clearly many of us are aware of the shift into Visual Studies, influenced by the rise of Cultural Studies, which renovated and expanded iconography and formalist-based Art History courses in a number of academies in the 1980s and 1990s. I think this shift was in line with Piya’s thinking about an expanded field of cultural production: art, textiles, architecture, spatial organisation, film etc. Teaching from books and drawings is not in itself ‘old school’, which would refer to research methodolgies in the absence of post marxist, post-colonial contextuality, discourse theory, or class or cultural analysis. I think Piya was not old school. He was dogmatic as hell, but quite open to all forms of cultural production and circulation.
Picking up on Kelvin’s idea for tertiary development, I totally agree. Many of us have put considerable study into SE Asian. As just one example, I developed a course in Australia on modernist/po-mo art from the region mostly for Asian students there. I suggest a useful enterprise would the the formation of an interest group on these topic, with an eye on developing the discourse? Isn’t Rogue Art also working in this direction?