Teng Nee Cheong, Untitled, No. 267, 2000
Charcoal on paper
88 x 117.5 cm (visible), 105 x 135.5 x 4 cm (framed)
Condition: Good, with foxing on the top right corner of the work and mould within the frame.
Certificate of Authenticity from the Estate of Teng Nee Cheong available
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Exhibited
Embodiment | Sentience. The Private Museum, Singapore, 4 October–9 December 2018.
Literature
Sabapathy, T. K. Embodiment | Sentience. Singapore: The Private Museum, 2018, p. 44.
Teng, Nee Cheong. Those the Gods Love Grow Mightier. Singapore: Gajah Gallery, 2010, p. 123.
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By the 1990s and 2000s, Teng Nee Cheong's male nudes had become among the most intimate explorations of same-sex desire produced by a Singaporean artist of his generation. Where his earlier figure drawings adhered to the conventions of academic study, these works are marked by tenderness, quiet sensuality, and an unmistakable emotional intimacy. They reflect the same elegance and technical assurance found throughout his practice, while offering a deeply personal perspective on the male figure.
Created during a period when sex between men remained criminalised in Singapore, these drawings were seldom exhibited publicly during the artist's lifetime. They remained within his private collection until they were first shown in 2018, five years after his passing. Their delayed public emergence speaks not only to the social climate in which they were made, but also to the histories of visibility and concealment that Nauti seeks to explore.
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Teng Nee Cheong 邓尔昌 (Singaporean, 1951–2013) studied at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (1966–1968) under the influence of mentors like Georgette Chen and Ng Yat Chuan. Throughout his career, Teng demonstrated mastery across oil, pastel and charcoal, though it is his intimate still lifes that reveal a quieter, more contemplative strand of his practice.
In these early to mid‑career works, Teng imbued everyday produce with both formality and lyricism. Teng’s still lifes occupy an important place within his wider oeuvre, bridging his training in Nanyang figure and local landscape traditions with the more ornate, symbolic narratives he later developed. They demonstrate his capacity for attentive observation and formal refinement, serving as foundational studies in colour, shape and composition.
Teng’s early career laid the groundwork for what would become a highly individual and expressive body of work. In 1978, he received the Ministry of Culture Special Award, marking a moment of national recognition that affirmed his artistic direction. While he would go on to explore identity and queerness in later decades, his earlier works already signalled enduring interests in visual storytelling, ornamentation, and cultural synthesis—elements that would come to define his singular artistic language.
(Photographed in May 2026)