SINGAPOREAN
1910 — 1985

Chen Chong Swee is one of Singapore’s first-generation artists and an influential art educator, writer, and painter. Chen, also known as Chen Kai, became a key figure in the development of the Nanyang style; he went on the historic 1952 trip to Bali with his fellow Xinhua graduates and peers Chen Wen Hsi, Cheong Soo Pieng and Liu Kang, which resulted in a more clarified sense of the Nanyang aesthetic. A realist painter, Chen was one of the first artists to depict Singapore and Southeast Asian subject matter in traditional Chinese ink as well as a pioneer in integrating Western and Chinese aesthetic traditions in watercolours, oils, and Chinese ink. An analytical and prolific scholar, Chen wrote a body of essays which contained discourses on various aspects of visual arts. In 1969, Chen co-founded the Singapore Watercolour Society with fellow artists like Lim Cheng Hoe and Loy Chye Chuan, also contributed immensely to the development of Singapore art through various roles in local art organisations. In 1995, the National Arts Council established the Chen Chong Swee Art Scholarship Fund in honour of Chen to support research programmes and overseas postgraduate studies in the field of visual arts.