Lady in the Red Dress

Malaysian-born Chia Yu Chian (1936-1990) was the first Southeast Asian recipient of a scholarship from the French government to study in Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts de Paris (1959-1962). An active participant in the local and regional art scene in the 1950s and 1960s, Chia had exhibited extensively, regionally and internationally in France (1959) and Germany (1960), with his first solo exhibition in Malaysia (1956).Influenced by Singapore’s pioneer artists Chen Wen Hsi (1906-1991) and Cheong Soo Pieng (1917-1983), Chia fervently produced paintings that depict the people, their culture and landscape of Southeast Asia. ‘Lady in the Red Dress’ is a portrait of a lady in a red ‘kebaya’ (blouse) and colourful sarong.