AUNG MYINT | Dots. Lines. Crosses. Selections from 1990s to now

Aung Myint’s ‘Dots. Lines. Crosses’ is a concise exhibition that features highlights of the artist’s painting oeuvre from the 1990s to now. Aung Myint (b. 1946) has a special place in the developing timeline of Myanmar modern and contemporary art. His art and the Inya Gallery that he inaugurated in 1989 have acted as change-maker for many artists who participated by painting and exhibiting there. Straddling between modern and contemporary movements, he remains an artist who has catalysed the developing contemporary scene. In the late 1970s to 1980s he strode the bumpy road of modern art development, influenced by Aung Soe and given artistic direction by Kin Maung Yin. This exhibition traces a trajectory of his paintings based on the artist’s exploitation of basic dot-line art and design theory produced over 30 years. Works from several major series of the artist Aung Myint show the development of his painting, his streamlining of colour, brushstroke and application on canvas. The exhibition gives deeper insight into the development of his renowned Red and Black paintings. Works from his painting series include the 1990s abstract expressionistic work in colours; transitional pieces to red and black paintings including the ‘XO’ works and flag works; and expressionistic red and black faces. Included is one interactive installation piece from ‘The Human Mind is Changing Every Moment’, 2014.

Aung Myint (born 1946, Myanmar) is a self-taught artist working in painting, installation and performance. Since 1995 his work had caught the attention of curators at the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum and Singapore Art Museum. His paintings are also in the collection of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, being exhibited in No Country, 2013-14. He has had numerous solo and group exhibitions including at the Royal Tropics Museum, Amsterdam (1998), Imaging Selves, Singapore Art Museum (1998), ASEAN Masterworks, Kuala Lumpur (1997), and New Paintings from Myanmar, The Substation, Singapore (1996). Regarded by many as the ‘father of contemporary art’ in Myanmar, his solo at TS1 Gallery in Yangon (2014) was accompanied by a commemorative publication 14 A.M., and followed by 15 A.M. in Singapore, a solo side-by-side with his close colleague San Minn (1951 – 2022).