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Singapore Contemporary 2017
Artist's interview with Dr Sian Jay
Although Patrick Teo’s paintings convey an image of children doing what children do best – playing and having fun in the simplest of ways – they underscore a childhood that was far from easy. The laughter portrayed in many of the paintings represent the childhood memories that the artist chooses to preserve, the face that the audience sees.
Patrick was born in 1942 in a farming kampong in what was then the remote countryside of Upper Yio Chu Kang. His first few years were lived under the Japanese Occupation, a hard time for many Singaporeans, and Patrick was later known as a ‘country boy’ by his friends. The post war years continued to be a struggle; Patrick’s family lived in an isolated area with no infrastructure, and hunger was a constant companion. Water was drawn from a common well, and when darkness fell a single kerosene lamp illuminated the family home. Even school was a challenge for the six-year-old Patrick who had to walk one and half kilometres to catch a bright yellow and white bus designated on the route to Punggol that would take him a further three and half kilometres to school. On one memorable occasion the bus home was so crowded that Patrick couldn’t get on, and instead of waiting the two hours for it to return – it was the only bus serving the area – the intrepid little boy decided to walk home. This walk opened up another world that was to fuel the creative imagination of a child.
As he walked, he came across a stretch of road lined by shop-houses. He entered a little hive of activity - he watched the hawkers calling the wares, vendors beckoning people to buy, and everywhere, the rhythmic click-clock tapping of wooden clogs. A little further on at a busy intersection, the little explorer encountered a Chinese opera stage and stopped to listen to the loud percussion sounds of gongs and cymbals.
Having then decided to find a shortcut home, Patrick followed his instincts and headed for Flower Road where he managed to navigate his way down a series of small lanes. It opened onto a vista that had his eyes open wide in amazement. The thick foliage of different shades of green was punctuated by pockets of orange, yellow and bright red. A wider path led Patrick to a piece of undulating ground in which stood a huge tree blanketed by crimson flowers that appeared to cascade down like a waterfall.
So vivid are these memories that Patrick can bring them clearly to mind all these years later. He had discovered the delights of drawing and was able to recreate the things he saw on his homeward adventure. These are among the memories that are recounted in the paintings he makes today.
Patrick also remembers how he struggled at school trying to make sense of the alphabet and other lessons under a teacher who paid no attention to him. He looked forward to the long vacations when he and his three siblings would take off on further adventures of exploration in the surrounding countryside, where a world that only children can perceive waited for them. They swam in the pond, caught fighting fish in the streams, fought spiders in the undergrowth, plucked fruit from abandoned trees and played games.
Patrick recalls later visiting places like Katong where fishermen cast their nets, the coconut plantations of Paya Lebar and the vendors staggering under their loads at Joo Chiat. Among the throngs of Chinese immigrants in Chinatown, Patrick remembers watching the Samsui women strolling around. He even went to Brani Island with its stilt houses along the water’s edge, and watched the water taxis plying back and forth to Sentosa.
Acknowledgement
Dr. Sian Jay
Dr. Jay is an Oxford educated anthropologist with a passionate interest in art, architecture and design history.
Formerly a researcher in the departments of Ethnography and Oriental Antiquities at the British Museum in London, and an Editor for the Macmillan Dictionary of Art, she is now based in Singapore.
Dr. Jay both writes on and teaches the history and theory of art, architecture and design at various institutions including Lasalle College of the Arts, and runs anthropology courses for the University of buffalo - NY in of art, architecture and design at various institutions including Lasalle College of the Arts, and runs anthropology courses for the University of Buffalo - NY in Singapore. She has edited and contributed to a number of publications including the acclaimed Indonesian Heritage Series, a book on Indonesian Tribal Art, and several books on Indonesian design.
A keen traveller and researcher, Dr. Jay travels frequently back to Europe to study art and architecture, usually with a group of students in tow. She most recently collaborated with the Singapore Institute of Architects to research and to write a book on the History of the Architectural Profession in Singapore.