Artist Biograhpy
Cherngzhi Lian is an Artist living and working in Singapore. He was born in 1979 and received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Time-Based Media Studies from the Columbus College of Art, Ohio. There, he was placed on a two-year extensive foundation programme in which he honed intensively his artistic skills in traditional mediums.
Subsequent to the foundation programme, he was awarded a graduate associateship for his Master of Arts in Design Development from The Ohio State University. A recipient of the Charles and Lucille King Family Foundation scholarship, Cherngzhi is currently a faculty of the Film Media Studies department at Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Singapore.
Cherngzhi thinks of his artworks as a study of the world and humanity and uses it as a tool to comprehend the human condition. He travels extensively with his sketchbooks; recording the visages of the people he met, places he had been to and cultures that he had personally experienced.
Through the offerings of his crafted creations, he hopes to inspire and share with his audiences the peace and joy he felt which he hopes to sustain whenever he creates and paints. Cherngzhi visited Bhutan twice in 2013. He was commission to paint the artwork used for Drukair’s Singapore 2014 Calendar.
Artist Statement
Landscape paintings of Bhutan
For the past year, I had been travelling with my sketchbook on a monthly basis. To date, I have travelled to Amsterdam, Rome, Paris, Barcelona, Florence, Berlin, Ohio, New York, Sydney, Yogyakarta, Cambodia, Beijing, Nanjing, Taiwan and Bhutan.
I have visited Bhutan twice and these five made-in-Bhutan “en plein air” (outdoor) watercolour paintings were completed during my second trip to Bhutan. The aforesaid paintings marks an important milestone in my travel sketches; simply because they were completed with longer sittings and with tools (like easel and larger papers) that I normally would not have carried on my other trips.
All these were made possible because DrukAsia, my tour agent, had kindly sponsored my second painting trip after I had completed their Year 2014 calender with paintings I had made during my first trip to Bhutan. As such, with everything taken care of by DrukAsia, I was able to fully immerse myself in the tranquility of Bhutan throughout the entire painting process of my second trip there.
Most of the five paintings were painted on-site and completed within one sitting of six hours. The painting of “Punakha Dzong”, however, presented a little challenge; because it required a sitting of two days due to its extensively rich vibrant details and a change in lighting conditions during the first sitting
Works