Quotes of the Day
On a hot, summer day, artist Tan Swie Hian, 60, stands poised before a four-story-high canvas in the middle of St. Marcos Square, surrounded by Venice's celestial domes. Suddenly, Tan leaps toward the immense sheet, wielding his brush like a swordsman as he swiftly inscribes an immense poem; inky Chinese characters that tell of sleeping pillows and dreamy, butterfly wings. Singapore's most famous artist is doing at the Venice Biennale what he has long done back home in East Asia: combining East and West, through multiple disciplines, with the explosive precision of a bombmaker.
In Singapore, a country that has struggled to produce artists who excel in even one medium, it's startling to find someone like Tan, who has thrived in so many different art forms and has achieved international acclaim for all. In January, Tan won the Crystal Award from the World Economic Forum, which held a major exhibition of his works at Davos. Tan is also currently building the first Earth Art Museum in Qingdao, China—a $690,000 project that sprawls over two mountainous kilometers—where Tan directs a crew of carvers to inscribe his calligraphy into the rock-filled museum. He has had 36 books of his Chinese poetry published and his paintings are regularly sold to collectors throughout Asia. "Tan Swie Hian is Singapore's most prolific artist in terms of the range of media he works in—from literature, calligraphy, painting, sculpture, performance to design," says Kwok Kian Chow, director of the Singapore Art Museum. Tan recently showcased the diversity of his talents in Instant Is a Millennium, the opening gala performance of the recent Singapore Arts Festival. The project took Tan two years to develop, during which he directed musicians, set designers, seamstresses and interpreters. During the show, a montage of Tan's vibrantly colorful paintings was projected onto a video screen while a narrator recited Tan's poetry to musical accompaniment by the Singapore Chinese Orchestra.
Tan's eclecticism—if he is like the Buddha, then he is a decidedly Renaissance Siddhartha—stems from an autodidact's caprice. As an artist, he has felt his way to artistic nirvana through experimentations in brushwork, ink tones, language and the magic that happens when all three are harmoniously combined. He graduated with a degree in English literature from Singapore's Nanyang University before becoming an artist and holding his first exhibition at the city-state's National Library in 1973. He converted to Buddhism that year, and his spiritual epiphany made him give up painting for four years, when he felt that enlightenment was more fulfilling than art. He picked up the brush again only when the then French embassy cultural attaché Michel Deverge threatened to end their friendship if he didn't. In 1978, Deverge helped Tan organize a successful exhibition of his works at the Gauguin Museum in Tahiti, and Tan has never looked back. Since then, his success has translated into financial security as his larger pieces, such as the Song of Sutra, now sell at auctions for as much as $72,500.
"All my customers are very rich," he says with a smile, and tells me they are mostly bankers, doctors or industrialists. "My cheapest paintings cost $28,700". Despite his Zen leanings, Tan appreciates the good life his art has provided for him. He drives a trendy Mini Cooper in a country where vehicle-registration costs and taxes drive the price for that model up to $69,000, and he dines at Au Jardin, where the famous Dégustation menu comes with a bill for more than $80. Tan acknowledges he is a big spender: "Buddhism is not against making money; it's against being hooked on money. You have to make it to share it with others." He then recounts how he once spent $8,600 on a 1945 bottle of wine to drink with friends.
As a Buddhist, Tan embodies those paradoxes inherent in this illusory, earthly life. He is a wealthy man who potters around in denim shorts and sandals and still lives in Singapore's notorious Geylang red-light district. "You see prostitutes all the time," he says before adding that he continues living there in memory of his parents, from whom he inherited the house. His daily routine is as austere as a monk's: he sleeps until 1 p.m., and when he wakes, he meditates before climbing 1,000 steps to warm up his calf muscles for his strenuous calligraphy sessions. He works through the night and goes to bed at 7 a.m.
Tan credits both his creative and material success to his enlightenment. "Many artists in Singapore feel very stifled", he observes. "Singaporeans are materialistic; they don't read Plato or Shakespeare, they only read numbers." However, Tan doesn't feel restricted by Singapore's uncreative environment. He explains that Zen has helped him free his mind, and "when you have a free mind you can live in Singapore or a prison cell ... you can live very lavishly but you can also live in fasting." And with that, he offers to treat me to dinner at Au Jardin the next time we meet.
- Hwee Hwee Tan / Singapore
- A devout Buddhist, Singaporean artist Tan Swie Hian leads a posh life with Zen-like discipline