Survival

Credit Line: Gift of Ian Holliday 2023, Collection of SMU

Dawei Lay (b. 1982, Tanintharyi Region) graduated from Yangon's State School of Fine Arts in 2001. Since becoming a full-time artist in 2010, the artist has worked almost exclusively on the theme of women farm workers through two series titled Women Power and Survival. Coming from a family of farmers, Dawei Lay is both appreciative of the nurturing labour of farming and sympathetic to the plight of farmers in the face of military land grabs under the U Thein Sein government.

In the series Survival, his paintings predominantly depict the physically demanding agricultural work undertaken by women, as they are shielded from the elements by straw conical hats. Painted with faux wood grain textures and vertical striations to create a deliberate ruggedness, the landscape exudes an aged and weathered quality.

The SMU Art Collection has over 70 paintings from Myanmar donated by Ian Holliday. A specialist in Burmese politics, Holliday assembled the Thukhuma Collection which comprises of Burmese paintings largely dating from the transitional decade of the 2010s, presenting multiple artistic perspectives on a society in reform. On display at School of Social Sciences and Li Ka Shing Library, the gifted paintings depict the people, culture and land, from the streets of Yangon and rural peripheries to political icons and indigenous deities.