Latiff Mohidin, born in Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia in 1941 completed his primary education in Singapore. While in Singapore, at an early age, Latiff’s precocity in understanding paintings earned him the nickname, ‘Wonder Boy’. From 1960-1964, Latiff studied art at Hochschule fur Bildende Kunste in Berlin, Germany and did brief residencies in Paris and New York. Inspired by his exploration of Southeast Asia in 1964, Latiff has since produced compelling series of artworks – the result of a synthesis between his European experience and the rediscovery of his homeland. He is also a poet who has published several volumes of poetry. ‘Pago-pago, Landscape’ differs almost entirely from the rest of Latiff’s iconic Pago-pago series. The initial layer of the common interlocking forms is aggressively overwhelmed; brushed opaquely with swift and broad brushstrokes, the surface area is almost concealed. Perhaps ‘Pago-Pago, Landscape’ could be a point of departure of Latiff’s application on the impulse of nature’s energy and thence directing the forms skywards rather than horizontally landwards.
