Looking at Singapore today, we have much to be proud about. We’ve hosted world class events, built glitzy resorts, and made this city a home that is the envy of many around the world. Yet, if you remember, the affluence of modern Singapore is not something we have always enjoyed, and it wasn’t too long ago that things were very different in Singapore.
Progress makes us forgetful, and keeping the memory of old Singapore alive is useful. It reminds us where we come from.
Much has been said about Tze Peng the painter, but not many of us know Tze Peng the father, the husband and the man. The book I wrote is not just about his art, but also his life.
When I first met him, he was completely not what I expected. I expected an old person, needing help in everything he did. When his face greeted mine, it carried no burden of health associated with old age.
At 90, and probably six feet tall, he had the gait of a 60-year old. That afternoon, the dark clouds hung low, the thunder rumbled in the distance. On a simple square table, he had a pot of tea and tea cups of another time. Wearing just a white loose shirt with no collar and dark blue cotton pants, Tze Peng’s eyes met mine. I told myself those were the eyes that saw the things he painted, while they were not agile and lively eyes of a young man, they were not eyes of a 90-year old either. With wrinkles around the ends, they looked with the weariness of someone who had seen life but they registered no resentment. Then it suddenly occurred to me he wasn’t wearing glasses. Could he really see me? I had my progressive glasses on and felt a sense of irony.
Then his eyes left me and looked out into the car park. Totally unaffected by the threatening elements outside, he told me the story of his life. It was a story not easily disturbed by dark clouds or the sound of rumbling thunder. It was a life of wisdom learned from heartaches and hard knocks. The twists and turns of a simple man who wanted just an honest life with his ink and brushes, but whose life spared him little rest. It was a story of a man who had to earn every cent, bear every insult and for whom recognition, when it finally arrived, was late.
Here are four key lessons I learned from my many afternoons with Lim Tze Peng.
Lesson 1: Value the kind and generous – In the early years, Tze Peng, a self-taught artist, took part in group exhibitions to ride on better-known names. In one show, organised by the famed artist Lee Man Fong, he didn’t sell any works. One the last day, Man Fong told him one of his paintings had sold and gave him $300. “It was a lot of money at that time and God knows I needed it.” A year later, he visited Man Fong’s home and saw his painting there. He paused and looked up at me. “Lee Man Fong is a good man,” was all he said.
Lesson 2: Believe in yourself – Tze Peng once reluctantly submitted a painting he had done on a trip to Bali as one of 20 local works Singapore would be sending for a competition in England. The Singapore authorities rejected it. They found it “neither Eastern nor Western”; it did not conform to any artistic tradition. Well known artist Cheong Soo Pieng fought hard for it to be included, asking the authorities to give the new artist a chance. The piece eventually made its way to England together with the other paintings. One morning about three weeks later, a doctor friend of Tze Peng called. He said he had heard on the BBC the night before that a Singaporean artist who painted Bali had won a special prize in England. Tze Peng rushed to the nearest newspaper stand, and there it was, a small article with his name wrongly translated. But there was no mistaking it, Lim Tze Peng had won his first international award. “They did not know who I was, did not care if it was Eastern or Western. They saw my talent…what has not been accepted as tradition, what was considered neither East nor West, is now my hallmark.”
Lesson 3: Be true to yourself – Commissioned by a Japanese collector to do a painting of a plum – for a considerable fee – Tze Peng tried and tried but was not satisfied with the results and gave up in the end. He passed the job on to an artist friend who did the work and got the money. “He bought me coffee. He was happy and so was I. I will not sell something that I think is not good.”
Lesson 4: Perseverance will be rewarded – A painter all his life, Tze Peng won recognition only in his 70s and was conferred the Cultural Medallion, the highest artistic honour, at 83. But he was not bitter. Two years ago, he became the first Singaporean artist to exhibit his works at the National Art Museum of China in Beijing, his life-long dream.
* Today Lim Tze Peng continues to paint and is currently reinventing his calligraphic style.
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