The first in the series of Club NAFA art exhibitions was launched with the full support of the Academy on 28 August 2009 at the Lim Hak Tai Gallery by NAFA Council Chairman, Professor Cham Tao Soon. Nanyang in Paris featured 50 works by 25 alumni and lecturers who took up art residencies at the NAFA owned art studios at La Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris between 1998 and 2008. As the only art institution in Southeast Asia to own the studios at the Cité, NAFA took the opportunity to announce the new management of the arts residency programme by NAFA International with special rates for Club NAFA members and NAFA alumni successful in their applications.
Cultural Medallion winners Lim Tze Peng, Chng Seok Tin, Tan Choh Tee, Young Artist Award winner Tay Bak Chiang, alumni artists Teo Kim Liong, Chieu Shuey Fook and prominent Malaysian artists Tew Nai Tong and Yeo Eng Hin were among those who were deeply moved and inspired by the Parisian landscape. These artists, fluent in the styles and genres of Western and Chinese painting, sought to capture the romance and adventure of the picturesque cultural capital – to rediscover their identity perhaps, in being “Nanyang”.
