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EXHIBITED
Distant Gamelan, Art Focus Gallery, Singapore, 1998.

An artist intrigued with the human figure and human capacity, this stunning portrayal of Kebyar, is an offshoot of the Balinese Legong dance. It was when the artist had travelled to Bali that he had encountered the beauty and understood the secrecy of Balinese ritual dances and their significance to the local community. In this, the artist had added to it his own mysticism with the stylised forms and textural play of colors. The dancer in this work emerges enigmatically from a misty, undefined space, unanimous of Zakii’s signature rendition.

The blue-striped kebyar glints in the light, fan in hand captured mid motion in expressionist brushstrokes. The background is kept dark which allows the viewer to focus completely on the dancer’s gaze, stance and hand movements.

Ahmad Zakii Anwar, better known as Zakii, has emerged as one of the most exciting, engaging and eloquent ‘urban realist’ artists in the region. A graduate of the School of Art and Design, MARA Institute of Technology Malaysia, the artist began his career as a graphic artist, producing some of the leading advertising graphics of his time before turning to fine art practice. Zakii came to attention for his virtuosity and command of a spectrum of media from charcoals to oils, building a reputation for stunning Photo Realist still-life paintings and expressive portraits. Notable exhibitions include Bones and Sinews, Andrewshire Gallery (USA, 2011), Disclosure, A Mid-career Survey, Galeri Petronas (Malaysia, 2008), Kota Sunyi, CP ArtSpace (Indonesia, 2007), Primordial Dream, Singapore Tyler Print Institute (Singapore, 2005), Shadowland, Plum Blossoms Gallery (Hong Kong, 2001), and Presence, Barbara Greene Fine Art (USA, 1999).