Ong Say Lean

Ong Say Lean attends our drawing sessions very regularly. She is blind in one eye and has rather dim sight with the other.  In the beginning she would frequently ask us what the colours in her palette were, sometimes requesting for more brown and green - the two colours she used most frequently to draw trees. Remarkably, after a few sessions, she needed less help to identify colours and began to produce more lively and colourful compositions.
Here are some samples of Say Lean's drawings.

The above was Say Lean's very first attempt.

Three weeks later, she started on her favourite subject - trees.

The theme of trees continued for a few weeks

 4 weeks later Say Lean begins to add some brighter colours

Some days, she still paints in subdued, grey hues.

Here is a picture of Say Lean doing a painting of 3 striking trees. 

 To see more drawings by Say Lean go to her Picasa Web Album:-

https://picasaweb.google.com/liokee/OngSayLean?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Khoo Seang Sim

Seang Sim is small in size, rather hunched, but still mobile and healthy. She is able to walk slowly and steadily on her own to the Friday drawing sessions.

After experimenting with using colours in different ways, she found a particular style which she repeated, session after session. 

Seang Sim's very first drawing on 8 July showing her playing with different colours around a circle.

Seang Sim's third drawing.

She spent the fourth session dabbing out different colours from her palette.

Then, in the next two sessions, Seang Sim plays with different ways of using her brush and copies a bit from what others near her are doing in their painting. 

By the eighth session, Seang Sim arrives at a painting style which she then repeats for the next few sessions.

See more of Seang Sim's drawings in her web album at:-
https://picasaweb.google.com/liokee/KhooSeangSim?authuser=0&feat=directlink

Wong Sweat Jong

Wong Sweat Jong, a soft spoken gentle lady, needs a lot of encouragement to get started and to keep going. It takes her a long time to decide where to start and what to do.  Yet, on some days, when she relaxes and lets her brush flow, she has produced some beautiful pieces of abstract art.  When these are put up on the wall, she will smile in agreement that yes, they are beautiful! To view Sweat Jong's work, go to her web album at:-

https://picasaweb.google.com/liokee/WongSweatJong?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCKbTpdajiZSnJQ&feat=directlink

Kam Lan and Sweat Jong usually sit side by side, during the Friday drawing sessions.

Huah Kam Lan

Huah Kam Lan, another of our regulars, does not like to talk much. She draws with a combination of bold strokes and fine details, sometimes using both paints and crayons to produce bright, colourful and dramatic drawings. 

                                 To see more drawings by Kam Lan go to:-

.https://picasaweb.google.com/liokee/HuahKamLan?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCI7lyuy8yLGOQA&feat=directlink

Siew Yok Kam

Yok Kam is a polio victim since young. She is one of our regulars, coming to the sessions in her wheelchair every week without fail.  Despite the fact that only two fingers on her right hand are functional and she holds the brush with difficulty, she perseveres to finish her painting. She needs to take breaks every now and then.  As her hand gets tired, the strokes become more shaky but she has produced some colourful and interesting compositions.

She looks forward to the sessions and is one of the earliest to arrive.  She makes friends easily and strikes up conversation with those sitting  around her.  One day she cheerfully demonstrated to me the different self-designed tools that she used to help her move her limbs - eg tying ribbons to both feet so she can lift them herself.

To see more paintings by Yok Kam, go to her web album at:

https://picasaweb.google.com/liokee/SiewYokKam?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJyeveXb3YXe4wE&feat=directlink

14 October 2011 - 15th Session

The airy corridor on the 2nd floor of the main building is where we gather every Friday, starting around 130 pm. By 2pm you can see two rows of elderly persons, some in wheel chairs, busy with brushes and paints.  Today was a well attended session  - due to the special effort of a Home staff who wheeled in several new recruits. By now we have at least 10 regulars some of whom arrive before us!  We also had 4 First Year students from Universiti Sains Malaysia who had come to see if they could join the project for one of the assignments. It was a particularly jovial session. Many new recruits promised to join us in the coming week.

Here are some of the new participants who joined us today :-

Mak Ah Looi

Chuah Keng Im

Ewe Ah Eng

Chong Siew Sim

Here are some interesting drawings done by the new participants.

The gentleman who drew the 3 dramatic birds below came for just this session. He walked up to our tables to see what was going on.  I invited him to sit down and try.  After some hesitation, he said I will draw some birds and you say what you think.  I was quite amazed when he drew the three birds in a few quick strokes.  I told him immediately that his painting was excellent.  He then said I will try another one and drew two fish.  As quickly as he did the drawings, he announced he was done for the day and walked away. We were not able to persuade him to come back again. 

It is part of the routine of each session that the participants stop whenever they feel like it.  Some spend all their time on one painting, some do two or three before they stop.   Many of them will then gather around a round table to have a drink and a small snack.

At the end of every session, we take down paintings done the previous week and put up all the paintings done this week on the wall next to the lift to the 2nd Floor. This is what the wall looked like at 3 pm on 15th October.

The last painting to go up was Philomena Rangel's, shown below.  She was the last to finish as she put in a lot of care and effort to produce this fine painting of boats, butterflies, birds and flowers.