Text by Choy Weng Yang

Recent Artworks By Choy Weng Yang The following text is excerpted from the art catalogue "Introduction to Five Directions - Recent Works of Five Singaporean Young Artists". The art exhibition was organized by Takashimaya Singapore Ltd in 1994. The five artists featured in the exhibition are: Wu Yizhu, John Lim Jianguo, Jimmy Ong, Prabhakara Jimmy Guo and Shale Jappa. The following text is about Prabhakara and his work. At the height of his successful series of abstract paintings in celebration of natures' grandeur, Prabhakara changed course in his art to a new series. His 6 works in this exhibition belong to this series. The crux of these new works is the phenomenon of motion and its mobile agility. It is a phenomenon which we all encounter in daily life in various forms but to a sensitive artist it may be abstract or illusive: a roaring train, a glowing light, the passing breeze. The act of transforming an idea into an abstract painting is a complex one - itself full of abstract connotation. The idea is only the spark not the full flame: The artist has the daunting task of taking the work through several crucial stages. The diverse requisites of the process include conceptualization, visualization and improvisation. Its success depends much on the artist's exploitation of his imagination. Through the years, Prabhakara has shown a rare gift of inventing exciting visual imageries which enrapture his audience. His vivid imagination is always at peak and his resourcefulness seldom fails him Thus, although the 5 works from 1994 in this exhibition were executed in close proximity in time, each has emerged as a distinct - indeed captivating - imagery in its own right, thriving on its own laws and logic. His imageries are never prosaic; their freshness, always intact. Began as a flicker, Full Moon Romance is now a threatening engulfing, fiery imagery. Yet it is the titillating interaction of reality and illusion, the assertive crimson and neutral white, the concrete element and infinite space which intrigue us. The artist flirts with the fleeting nature of our transient life in Celerity simultaneously teasing us with an illusive allegory. The sensations of mobility and its vibrations are given gull play in Entering Reality, despite the scattering forms the unity survives. Prabhakara's enigmatic art transports us to a new plane in visual experience. 1994