28/08/2025

LYFE THURSDAY | AUG 28, 2025

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Askandar Unglehrt’s insightful eye

W ALKING into Askandar Unglehrt: A Third Eye – A Tribute Exhibition at Harta Space in Ampang, Kuala Lumpur, the sense of rediscovery lingers in the air. Coinciding with Merdeka month, the exhibition does more than showcase works across five decades. It reflects on Malaysia’s evolving cultural identity through the eyes of a German-born academic who made Penang his home and Malaysia his muse. Life bridging East, West Born in Weingarten, Germany in 1943, Askandar arrived in Malaysia in 1972 after completing his doctorate in French literature at the Sorbonne, focusing on the surrealist poetry of Jean Arp. At Universiti Sains Malaysia, he taught French and German, but his life extended beyond the lecture halls. He immersed himself in Penang’s cultural scene, joining colleagues and local artists in exhibitions that often responded to global events, such as the Gulf War. “He was technically under Pusat Bahasa because he taught French and German, but he spent a lot of time in Pusat Seni. In those days, art was not as commercially oriented as today. Art was kind of a way to express themselves, related to the kind of current events in a way,” recalled his daughter Adela Askandar during a recent interview. It is this intersection of academia, politics and art that shaped Askandar’s eclectic output. Early surreal beginnings The exhibition begins with his Early Surreal Series (1983–84), a rediscovered collection of photomontages influenced by his years in Paris. These collages, originally exhibited in Germany in 1984, had long been thought lost until the family unearthed the originals in storage. “They were removed from the o Rediscovering works of German artist who made Malaysia home Ű BY YASMIN ZULRAEZ

Adela.

frames and actually just packed together with boards. We did not discover the originals until recently and they are really wonderful because they actually give an insight into his intellectual pursuit while he was at Sorbonne University,” Adela said. Eurocentric in form but already interspersed with Bollywood images and local references, these works reveal an artist on the cusp of shifting his gaze towards Malaysia. Symbols of East Coast From there, visitors encounter East Coast Kaleidoscopes (1988), perhaps his most recognisable series. Inspired by Kelantan’s decorated perahu kolek , Askandar mirrored and repeated motifs of flora, dragons and birds into symmetrical photomontages. Having married a Kelantanese woman, his annual journeys to the East Coast fed his fascination with the vernacular craft. The series reflects personal and cultural ties, but it also carries symbolic undercurrents. The artist was sensitive to religious and political shifts of the 1980s. His daughter noted how he avoided overt provocation but often embedded ambiguity. “He likes to create works such as this which is kind of ambiguous but could be read in different ways. But he was not the sort who enjoyed offending people, so sometimes he felt, maybe I do not want to offend too many people.” Malaysiana, search for identity The Malaysiana Series (1986–98) brings Askandar’s focus fully into Malaysia’s shifting identity. Using cuttings from newspapers, magazines and popular culture, he juxtaposed idyllic local landscapes

The gallery. – ALL PICS BY YASMIN ZULRAEZ/THESUN

Merdeka tribute The exhibition is curated by Ricardo Chavez Tovar and Adela, and spans works up to his last significant commissioned work Hikayat Munshi Abdullah (2003). More than a survey of artistic practice, it is an intimate portrait of a man described by friends as “a diluted German, intellectually grown in Paris and culturally adopted by Malaysia”. Askandar passed away in Penang in September 2022, but his voice resonates through his works. In resisting fixed meanings, he created space for multiplicity and dialogue. His “Third Eye” or Mata Hati (the eye of the heart) fused East and West, the everyday and the absurd, into an artistic lens uniquely his own. This Merdeka month, his works return not only as aesthetic objects but as cultural mirrors. They remind visitors that independence is as much about forging identity as it is about remembering the contradictions, humour and ambiguity of life. Askandar Unglehrt: A Third Eye – A Tribute Exhibition runs until Aug 31.

In doing so, his works probed what it meant to be Malaysian in a postcolonial era. As his daughter observed: “We are still finding ourselves, you know, as an identity since our independence. There are all these kinds of references, East and West, that we look up to and also a lot of imported symbols.” The humour of his approach, often laced with irony, reveals the absurdities of modern life and the cultural contradictions of a young nation. Paint-on-Print, beyond By the 1990s, Askandar turned his scalpel and brush to glossy magazine advertisements, particularly those exploiting women in fashion and cosmetics. In the Paint On Print Series, he used acrylic to censor, alter or transform these images into something altogether new. Long before digital remix culture, Askandar’s cut-and-paste technique, executed by hand, offered sharp commentary on consumerism and representation.

with cartoon characters, imported consumer symbols and fragments of mass media. Coffee Table for PAS, a1988 mixed media installation.

Mona Malaysia, a1989 mixed media collage.

The Early Surreal Series.

The Paint On Print Series.