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Breaking
Free.
AyeKo,Beginning
& Ending , 2000 , installation , dimensions
variable.
 Throughout
Southeast Asia there is an extraordinary
thirst for creativity.Even without the
facilities of the West, innumerable young
people struggle against seemingly
insurmountable obstacles to become artists
and to make art full time.Aye Ko is one such
artist,and he is gradually achieving become
artists and to make art full time.Aye Ko is
one such artist,and he is gradually
achieving an international reputation for
himself.
The modern art
movement in Myanmar,which began in the
mid-1950s,did not have the chace to progress
with any speed due to the self-isolation the
country soon went into and which lasted for
three decades.As is usual with a country
where traditional cultural norms are a part
of everyday life,creativity into more modern
and innovative thinking ways was,on the
whole,unacceptable.Yet,even in this stifling
atmosphere of rigid control,there were
pockets of small art movements even in towns
far from the capital.In these
places,innovation in art would be much
harder for the general audience to
accept.After all,tradition art was for
decoration,especially in religious
edifices.There is no tradition of hanginf
painting on the walls even as interior
decoration, and if any painting went on the
wall, it would be portraits of successful
ancestors in the homes of the wealthy,
By the late-1980s the urbanities at least
became more open to the idea of new trends
in the art world.This was the time that Aye
Ko, one of the more progressive artists of
the current Myanmar art secen,arrived in
Yangon,the capital city, from his birthplace
Pathein , a delta town.
Aye Ko,Footprints,2001,mixed media,8x4 feet
 With
his move to the capital he was determined to
break new ground in his art,seek new
influences , exhibition opportunities,and
grow his circle of friends."There was a
group of artists in Pathein,and my town also
produced quite a few successful
singers,poets,songwriters and artists," he
says."But mostly the artists were"
traditional: the
skilled works of fine art in both
watercolors and oils with subject matter
ranging from the pagoda on the hill.They
would band together and hold group shows
called Pan Ayeyar,I thinkthey had five shows
during that time.I was with them for about a
year.At that time,I was doing realism as
well the usual pagoda on the hill landscapes
and still lifes,but I felt something was
missing about what I was doing.I couldn't
remain in their group for long.Anyway I was
closer to the musicians.Even then,I was sort
of a loner so I didn't really have a lot of
close friends."
Aye
Ko,Woman,2002,mixed media on canvas 1.5x2
feet.
In
a nation in which traditions remain strong
and expections are high for the future of
children,Aye Ko's family was not amused when
he broke it to them that he would spend his
life as a painter.Any interest in the
arts,visual or performing, is a concern to
most parents in this developing country.The
religious tradition also treats the
enjoyment of the arts as something to
refrain from , if not to be considered a
downright sin.Pathein, a flourshing river
town,is the main trading point for goods
that come by river from business is in trade
and they could not comprehend his need to
paint.He was often scolded and told that he
would end up a beggar.He is the youngest of
seven sons,and all his elder were intent on
business and naturally enough appalled that
their baby brother had no thought if
following their footsteps.Aye Ko realized
from the time he was in his late teens that
a life committed to making money was not for
him.
At the same time, however , he knew that he
would need to earn for himself first if he
wanted to paint.He knew that he must be able
to support himself first in order to become
a painter,as his family was not about
to fund the life of an aspiring artist.He
went into his own sector of the family
business and by 1986,when he was 23 years
old,he was earning enough to gain his
freedom. He immediately traveled to Yangon
and made business a sidelune while he went
all out to
learn about art.Once in Yangon,he felt he
must first master the basics so he worked
closely with one artist for about a
month.The family tradition of hands-on work
may have been responsible for the way he
prepared for his life as a painter,first by
making sure of an alternate and steady
income and then by learning the ropes from
the bottom up.In this,he did not mean
learning the basic principles of art,but the
purely technical side of it.By that time in
the late 1980s,the availability of paint .and
brushes was no longer the problem it had
been a few years before,but ready-primed
canvases were not objects to be obtained at
any price.
Aye
Ko,Composition,2001,oil and enamel,46x122x1
cm each section (4 section)
 Unless someone specifically
brought in some from abroad,the local
artists learned
the painstaking process of stretching and
priming their own canvases,something that
was much better than the ready-to-paint
canvases sold in Western art shops.But
Yangon also opened up the art world for Aye
Ko in deeply personal ways that have
continued to influence him though tends
towards a more solotary life than other
artists in his community."In Yangon it was
easier to get publications on art,and there
are the libraries of the British Council and
the United States Information Service.After
I had learnt how to make good quality
canvases,I began to read,more than I could
in Pathein,on painting techniques of the
artists of the world,what the movements were
at the time,and I could also discuss things
I could nor understand with the core group
of Myanmar modern artists such as Kin Maung
Yin,Khin One,Maung Di,Aung Myint and San
Minn,for example.I was never too fond of
constant companionship so it was fine by me
to just study by muself most of the time."Even as he was eager to come into contact
with new trends,once Aye Ko found himself in
Yangon , he was , for sometime , unable to
grow out of the traditional realism that had
occupied him for some years.Soon he began to
feel keenly a need to explore more about
himself and what he wanted to do.In 1988,he
met Min Wae Aung of New Treasure Gallery and
he joined it.And,although he was still doing
realisn,he began to make impressionistic
works,quickly followed by expressionistic
works.He realized he had,at least for the
time being,found the things that he had been
searching for."I knew I was on the right
path," he says,"especially when I progressed
very soon to non-objective art.I began to
discover the relationship between colors and
shape,with brushstrokes being the
connection,I shold say."
(Aye Ko,Landscape ,
2000 , mixed media , 3x4 feet)
 Aye Ko works mostly in oils,although he has
tried the more gentle moods of watercolots
but found they did not suit him.At New
Treasure Gallery he only showed realistic or
impressionistic works.But feeling out of
place with his abstract works in the
Gallery,he transferred membership to the
more innovative Inya Gallery owned by artist
Aung Myint.There he found a miche,a place
where he felt free to search and
experiment.It was a rewarding time.He was most influenced by the works of the
late painter and singer Khin One and Aung
Myint,among others.Khin One was one of the
avant-garde artists of the modern movement
during the restrivtive 1970s.Khin One was
the first to hod a solo show of abstract
works,as well as to bring installation art
to Myanmar.His works were received with rave
reviews and by now in collections both
abroad and in Myanmar.Beginning in 1990,Aye
Ko started to exhibit regularly in annual
art shows.His works at the time showed broad
spectrums of primary colors that dazzled
with a disquieting rage from his
canvases.Later,the strokes thinned to flying
lines and drips strongly suggestive of works
of American Abstract-Expressionist Jackson
Pollock,but with a brooding intensity.His
flying brushstrokes portray an anger on the
brink of explosion rather than joyou Ss
abandon.A work such as Sunset Melody (1996)
amply illustrates this.Aye Ko appears
calm,not a persin prone to outbursts of
temper,but a seeming gentleness masks a
strong mind in search of peace.He
admits that the frustration he feels is
sometimes worked out in his paintings.As he
moved on to a freer Abstract-Expressionism,he
said that his moods improved.His relentless
energy and the need to express himself fully
led him to try out new ventures,as when he
set uo Olive Art Gallery,which was also
devoted to modern works by various
well-known artists such as Khin One and
Maung Di and works of young of young
emerging artists."Even so, I began to feel
limited by what I can achieve" with brush
and paint," he said."I needed more."By the
late 1990s he was experimenting with
installations and performance art."In
performance art I liked the fact that I was
the medium,not canvas or paint and that I
can interact with the audience on a more
intimate and immediate level.I felt strong
vibrations when I perform.As humans,kindness
and cruelty can exist side by side within
us;they may even grow together.In the
end,however you live or feel there's only
the one certainty of death.This was one of
the themes of my performances."
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