Lim Eng Hooi

Born: 1939

Education: 1964 - Ruskin School of Fine Arts, United Kingdom

1969 - Byarn Shaw School of Drawing & Painting, London

Lim Eng Hooi was trained in a number of English art colleges during the 1960s. He taught painting at the art department of the Universiti Sains Malaysia in Penang for many years. His main preoccupation as a painter was with the systematic exploration of colour tonalities and optical colouristic effects. In this particular work, the artist has derived his subject matter from a rushing wall of water that one usually associates with rushing rapids. The very large size of the canvas helps emphasise the sheer power of the rushing waters as they flow over different forms in their path. This vigorous, expressionistic work, so meticulously executed with minutely rendered brush strokes and the rendering of subtle colour tonalities reflects the painstaking approach of the artist in highlighting optical and perceptual effects. One is reminded of the 2O~ century Italian Futurists such as Boccionni and Carra. On another level, one may also be reminded of the vitalistic organic energies inherent in traditional Chinese paintings. The artist has captured the essence of dynamic movement, violent even, in his closely observed, forcefully rendered depiction of Nature's restless, fluid energies.