Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2025

Thian Hock Keng Temple

Once again, I did two A4 size sketches on the cartridge papers with splashes left over for my senior classes. The end result is quite interesting as I worked around the splashes of red and green. I often told people it is a moment of deliberation working on papers with random splashes. Don't hesitate, just do it.

I was sketching the pagoda within the temple compond. The pagoda was called "崇文阁“; the first Chinese private school built in 1849. The building next to it used to be a school set up by Singapore Hokkien Huay Kuan in 1913. You can read more about the rich heritage and culture in Chinese by Kua Bak Lim (柯木林); a respectable scholar. https://kuabaklim.blogspot.com/2013/07/blog-post_2125.html

Extract from the temple's website:
"Thian Hock Keng was built in 1840 along Telok Ayer Street, a bustling meeting point among min (闽) businessmen and an important congregation point for Hokkiens. Upon the completion of Thian Hock Keng, southbound immigrants who had just landed or northbound immigrants heading back to China would always stop by the temple facing the waterfront to pray for calm waves and a safe journey.

The construction of Thian Hock Keng signified the transformation of an immigrant society to one that planted its roots. The temple, hailed to be the biggest building island-wide then, took many years of sweat and toil and heavy financial commitments to complete. It was also deemed to be the religious centre for the Chinese community at that time. Today, although Thian Hock Keng is primarily a min temple, its worshippers are not limited to min descendants. It has transcended dialect boundaries and worshippers are from all walks of life.

Thian Hock Keng is a rare temple that encompasses Taoism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Ancestral Worship. In addition to its main deity, Goddess of the Seas, other deities include Goddess of Mercy and Confucius. Over the years, it has continued to attract devotees of different dialect groups and is especially crowded during birthday celebrations of deities."

Cartridge Papers Size: 297 x 210mm

You can find out more about the temple at their website https://thianhockkeng.com.sg/site/

YMCA

In my classes that I teach, there is a topic on colour washes and I prepared many cartridge papers splashed with colour washes for the participants. I used the left over 135 gram cartridge papers for the sketchwalk at YMCA. The colour washes are yellow and purple, red and green.

I was not sketching the YMCA building as I was sitting comfortably at the Social Kitchen on level 4 of the YMCA building overlooking the state-of-the-art School of the Arts (SOTA). My youngest son graduated from SOTA and went on to be an Architect. At that time of its inception, while all the elite schools such as Raffles Institution, Raffles Girls School, Convent of Holy Infant Jesus and St. Joseph Institution etc etc were moving out of central city area, government put the new SOTA back into the heart of the city. WOHA, the architect of SOTA designed the running track on the roof top and theatres, cafes etc were located on the lower floors opened to the public.

You can watch the video I made here

For the building history of YMCA Singapore, you can click this link.

Cartridge Paper 135 grams
Noodler's Lexington Grey ink over colour washes