HO HO YING

Ho Ho Ying (b.1935, China) is a prominent pioneer of Modern Art in Singapore who cofounded the Modern Art Society Singapore in 1964. He received the Cultural Medallion in 2012 and Nanyang Distinguished Alumni Awards in 2014 for his invaluable contributions to the visual arts community. The exhibition features paintings over the course of several decades of his work from the early 1950s to the early 21st century. The artworks range in themes; from still life to expressionist pieces, canvas to rice paper, displaying a broad range of artistic expression that captures his life and the times he has lived in. These works enthral us with abstract art that has metamorphosed with his own distinctive identity. Ho’s signature style is Western Abstract Expressionism in which he emphasises the use of drops, dribble, colours, forms and strokes which has become his trademark.

In his works, he often draws inspiration from Chinese culture, calligraphy, and philosophy as well as the spontaneity of abstract expressionism. He has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions in Singapore and abroad since 1963. A scholar of Chinese language and literature, he is a prolific writer under his reputed moniker, Zi Mu, and authored numerous books, short stories and contributed to the growing parameters of critical artistic discourse in Singapore.

Ho is renowned for his visionary and avant-garde approach to art. For over 60 years, he has been painting passionately, freely expressing his visions of the world around him, making him one of the most established and versatile contemporary local artists. He also pioneered his own unique hybrid of Modern Western and Chinese Creative Calligraphy in 1995 called “Ban Ban Shu” (半边书). This innovative form of writing involves a unique mix of Eastern and Western art styles that took decades to develop which Ho found particularly intriguing and is greatly passionate about. From Chinese calligraphy of a schoolboy years to Western Impressionism, Fauvist Masters, Surrealism and Free Movements, Ho’s art style has evolved over the years to coalesce to find peace in the aesthetics of expressionism. At the core of his artistic philosophy lies the principle of Taoist sayings about freedom - to live free of systematic restrictions. Ho presents abstract, figurative and calligraphy paintings.

A firm believer in self-improvement and creative development, Ho constantly pushed his work. Not content with simply imitation, the decades were a form of upward movement for him, expanding his own horizons by exposure to the other cultures and forms of art.