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It was a family vacation in 1977 to commemorate the opening ceremony of the Chia Clansmen Association, but what followed the two-day visit to Pulau Ketam were a few dozens of sketches of the glimpses of residents at work and the landscape of the small island captured with the nib of a pen. This work, painted in rich impasto, is a result of the trip and shows goods being loaded onto the boat directly from the stilt, thatched-roof houses with short makeshift platforms. As the title suggests, it is a laborious activity but it is a show of endurance and a page of human economic life until the late 80s.

Born in Johor, Chia Yu Chian graduated from Nanyang Academy Fine Arts, Singapore in 1958. He was the first artist from Straits Settlement to receive a French Government scholarship at Ecole Nationale des Beaux Arts in Paris (1959-1962). He was commissioned to do a mural painting Life in Malaysia for Malaysian High Commission in Paris. Yu Chian received the awards of Honourable Mention, Salon des Independent and Societe des Artistes Francaise, Paris.