Lot 55 | 28 August 2022

Signed and dated “Khalil Ibrahim 59” on lower left

It goes without saying that Khalil Ibrahim was and posthumously remains the most important artist in the Malaysian art landscape. Khalil was born to paint. While he began his career as a self-taught painter, the artist foresaw a future in art which prompted a move to Kerdau in 1957. There, he was introduced to Claude Gibb Ferguson, the Temerloh District officer at the time. With Ferguson as his mentor, Khalil was introduced to the Sultan of Pahang, HRH Sultan Abu Bakar Ri’ayatuddin Al-Mu’adzam Shah by Ferguson, who would later offer the artist a Pahang State Government scholarship to the prestigious St.Martin School of Art in Sept 1960. The strict and disciplined teaching at St.Martin meant that most of Khalil’s time was spent learning the fundamentals of drawing and the study of the human form. Subsequent subjects involved painting in watercolours and oils as well as the various techniques relating to the composition of colour, form and composition.

Khalil Ibrahim graduated from the prestigious St. Martin’s School of Art & Design, United Kingdom in 1964. The late artist was a master storyteller, telling tales of his home in the East Coast as well as its landscapes through his artworks. Entitled, ‘Pahang River Landscape, 1950’s’, this work is no exception, giving audience a glimpse of beauty through his eyes. Khalil and his affinity for detail and colours are on full display here, capturing the flora surrounding the river, traditional Malay wooden houses, a mountain range in the distance and sampan docked at the river bank. The 1950’s was when Khalil produced bounteous landscape works similar to that of “Sunrise” in terms of craft and scenery. These include the “Pahang Series”, “Landscape Series” and “Sunset”, all produced in 1957. Khalil’s landscapes were his Eden and it can be observed that he was not concerned with any specific object or subject in his vast landscape which was how he liked it and wanted to depict.