Born in Singapore in 1964, Jimmy Ong won the 1980 UOB Painting of the Year Competition (Youth 2nd Prize), and during the mid-1980s to early-1990s received scholarships to study in the USA and in Italy. Accomplished in sculpture and painting, Ong’s trademark are his expressive charcoal drawings.This drawing is full of movement, however the overdrawn lines and flailing limbs do not reveal whether the couple is in the throes of ecstasy or aggression. As points of reference, the cynical title is taken from an eponymous play whose leaflet Ong acquired in London in 1987, while the drawing incorporates several anecdotes: a friend confiding his stable marriage made his extramarital affair possible; memories of Ong’s mother leaving his father for another man; and Ong’s belief he could potentially act as his mother did. For Ong, these love-triangle elements appeared darkly comical and aptly suited to the title.
