The Birth of Chua Kooning

Greetings!

Before you start wondering what kind of parent would give their child a name as weird as Chua Kooning, it might help to tell you that it's not a person's name. This blog is shared between us and that quirky name is the result of mashing our names together. Who are we? Oh right, we forgot to mention that. We are Chua Ek Kay and Willem de Kooning. You might be wondering how on earth can we meet each other when we're literally living on opposite sides of the world. Well, the magic of internet, we would say. Both of us coincidentally met online on Facebook and started talking about art. Now, we're close pals and have recently decided that we should create a blog to share with you more about us as artists.

So..., here's a bit about us:

***

Hallo, hoe gaat het? I'm Willem de Kooning, but you can call me Bill like my friends do. As you can probably tell, I'm a Dutch American, born on 24 April 1904 Rotterdam, Netherlands. 

My parents are, sadly, divorced when I was 3, and I lived with mother. If there's anything I remember about her is that she's fierce. Very fierce. Anyway, I studied at Rotterdam Academy of Fine Arts and Techniques for 8 years but moved to USA in 1926. It wasn't really a pleasant journey partly because I felt seasick most of the time but I guess it's mostly because I'm afraid people will find out where I'm hiding and know that I'm not supposed to be on that British freighter. It was worth it though, I finally reached the Land of the Free and Home of the Brave! 

I took on many jobs to make a living, such as being a sign-writer, house-painter and odd-job man. However, I finally settled down as an artist and lived in Manhattan Studio since 1937. In 1938, I took, Elaine Marie Fried, or simply Elaine, in as my apprentice. One thing led to another and um, yeah, she became my wife in 1943. Google her up! She also became an artist, you know? 

In 1948, I held my first solo exhibition at Charles Egan Gallery, New York. I continued painting and if I remember correctly, I was at my most productive in the 1980s; I painted more than 300 canvases during that time. 

Now, as I age, my memory is deteriorating due to dementia and I'm starting to show signs of Alzheimer's disease. How sad. Oh, and one last thing before I forget, I am getting more and more forgetful nowadays because of dementia and people say I might have Alzheimer's disease. It's tough being old, sigh.
Anyway, Chua Ek Kay, bless his heart, will now tell you more about himself.

***

你好? I am Chua Ek Kay, a Chinese artist. I am born in Guangzhou, China on 21 November 1947 but moved to Singapore shortly after I was born. My family is not rich at all and as the eldest son (6 younger brothers, for goodness sake can you imagine that?!), I had the responsibility to earn money for the family. 

So it was only until in 1975 that I learned traditional Chinese ink painting and seal carving from Master Fan Chang Tian, a "Shanghai School" (calligraphy, classical poetry, painting and seal-carving ) ink painter. 

In 1985, I decided to be a full time artist while teaching at the National Univeristy of Singapore's Extramural Studies Department to support my passion. My watershed periods were during the late 1980s to 1990s when I held my first exhibition at the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, featuring a selection of Chinese brush paintings and calligraphy and won the UOB Painting of the Year and Juror’s Choice award at the Philip Morris Group of Companies ASEAN Art Awards. I also went to pursue further studies to learn more about Western paintings. Now, people call me the "bridge between Asian and Western art". I am flattered!

***

So that is the end of our self introduction! We hope that you might know us better after reading this post! See you in the next one!