ARTICLE - NATIONAL ART ICON DIES AT 81

Monday August 1, 2011

National art icon dies at 81

KUALA LUMPUR: National Art Laureate Datuk Syed Ahmad Jamal Syed Jamil Sahil (pic) died on Saturday, leaving a legacy of his art in various forms and writings on Malaysian art and Malay aesthetics. He would have been 82 on Sept 19.
He had also made a profound impact as an academic, administrator and art activist.
A large crowd of people in the arts, friends and relatives paid their last respects to him as he was buried at noon yesterday at the Kampung Sungai Pusu cemetery in Gombak, near his house in Sungai Cincin.
Born in Muar in 1929, Syed Ahmad Jamal received his early art education at the Chelsea School of Art in London (1951-1955) and his art teacher's certificate at the London University from 1955 to 1956.
Between 1958 and 59, he lectured at the Malayan Teachers Training College in Kirby in England.
He was awarded the Fulbright scholarship to study Sculpture at the Chicago Art Institute from 1963 to 1964. In 1974, he achieved his Masters in Art History after a two-year stint at the University of Honolulu, Hawaii.
Syed Ahmad Jamal was awarded the nation's highest cultural award, the National Arts Award, the only visual artist so honoured in 1995.
He was conferred the Panglima Jasa Negara (PJN) which carries the title “Datuk” by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong in 1996 for his contributions in practically every field of art.
He was National Art Gallery (NAG) director from August 1983 to March 1991, and appointed a guest writer with the Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, head of the Specialist Teachers Training College in Cheras from 1961 to 1963 and director of the Asian Cultural Centre in Universiti Malaya from 1979 to 1982.
When he took over the NAG, it moved over from its makeshift Ampang space (the present Matic) to the reconverted Majestic Hotel.
As NAG director, his liberal acceptance of Photography and Ceramics as art forms by themselves, and also promoting contemporary practices of Video Art and Installations allowed for a healthy inter-disciplinary development.
His NAG tenure was also known for the opening of the Creative Centre for fringe and alternative art exhibitions.
Since his first major exhibition Retrospective accorded by NAG in 1975, he was given a second major show called Historical Overview at the now defunct Nanyang Gallery of Fine Art in 1995. In both these exhibitions, the director was Joseph Tan Chan Jin.
His other major solos were Between Heaven and Earth (Galeri Petronas, 2000), On and Off King's Road (Galeri Petronas, 2007) and culminating in the extraordinary monster exhibition called Syed Ahmad Jamal: Pelukis at and by NAG featuring the most comprehensive view of Syed Ahmad Jamal's multi-faceted contributions and a 600-page-plus coffee-table book.
It was the first time an art exhibition was officially launched by the King Tuanku Mizan Zainal Abidin.
Syed Ahmad was recognised internationally. He was awarded the Alliance Francaise Award in 1971, the Australian Cultural Award in 1984, and the Asean Award (for Visual Arts) in 1987.
He also wrote two major books, Rupa dan Jiwa (1992), which was later translated into English under the title, Soul and Form, and the autobiographical Kunang-Kunang (Fireflies, 1999).
Former Malaysian Institute of Art principal Dr Choong Kam Kow described him as a kind, intellectual and artistic person whom he regarded as his mentor in many ways.
NAG director-general Datuk Mohd Yusof Ahmad while describing Syed Ahmad Jamal's demise as a big loss for the art world and the nation, said that he was a prolific artist who “left a large legacy of works that will be appreciated by and inspire generations of young people.”
Former NAG director Wairah Marzuki noted that Syed Ahmad Jamal helped found the Malaysian Artists Association to unite artists under one umbrella and to give them a stronger voice in agitating for change and benefits.
Syed Ahmad Jamal is a giant of Malaysian art with a mission and a vision, with a contribution to art in all its manifestations and a totality that is awesome.
He had said of his art: “I try to project the kind of inner sense of dimension. It's boundless. It's inside your mind, your sense and feeling. It's a void, the sort of endlessness of universal thing”.