Celebrating Malaysia’s intangible cultural heritage

Aspiring Malaysian students, leading contemporary artists, educators, and heritage and curatorial experts gathered to participate and witness the unveiling of this year’s winners at the Usaha Tegas Heritage Art Competition. The prize-giving ceremony was held yesterday afternoon at Element Kuala Lumpur hotel.

The Usaha Tegas Heritage Art Competition (Usaha Tegas Heritage) is one of the nation’s longest-running competitions and is a long-standing component of Usaha Tegas Group’s corporate social responsibility programmes. It is held annually to encourage young artists to showcase their talents whilst invoking a sense of pride in the nation’s rich cultural heritage in the hearts of Malaysian youth. 

Malaysian students from public and private institutes of higher learning were invited to submit artworks across five categories including oil/acrylic painting, mixed media, printmaking, charcoal/pencil/ink drawing and watercolour under a specified theme relating to cultural heritage. 

Marking the twenty-second edition of the competition, Usaha Tegas Heritage 2022 was themed “Intangible Malaysian Cultural Heritage” and succeeded in attracting 235 entries by students from over 30 institutions of higher learning across the country.

This year, first prize was awarded to Dulang Opah by Nurain Fatini Binti Abdul Jalil of UITM in the Oil/Acrylic Painting category; Alternative Performer by Lye Heng Jing of ATEC Academy (School of New Media Design) in the Mixed Media category; Nostalgic Khatam Quran Ceremony by Norfatihah Binti Yusof of Universiti Sains Malaysia in the Printmaking category; Penunggu by Wan Atiqa Ramli of UITM in the Charcoal/Pencil/Ink Drawing category and Heirloom by Kua Wei Lun of The One Academy KL in the Watercolour category.

The first prize winners each received RM 8,000.00 while the second, third and consolation prize winners each received RM 3,000.00, RM 2,000.00 and RM 500.00, respectively.

“This year’s competition invited students to submit artworks under the more specific theme of ‘Intangible Malaysian Cultural Heritage’ and the winning works capture not only the easily visible and recognisable symbols of the rich cultural traditions that thrive across our country, but also the hard work, wisdom and stories of our parents, grandparents and ancestors, and what we share as our natural environmental heritage,” Encik Shaharul Rezza Bin Hassan of UTSB Management Sdn Bhd said during his opening address at the prize-giving ceremony.

Intangible Malaysian Cultural Heritage

Usaha Tegas Heritage’s judging panel this year was led by master printmaker, artist Encik Juhari Said, Head of Fine Art at Malaysian Institute of Art and multi-disciplinary artist, Ms. Bibi Chew, Penang-based heritage building conservationist, Ar. Parama Nathan and National Art Gallery senior curator, Encik Syahrul Niza.  

Commenting on this year’s competition, Encik Juhari Said stated, “In art what is very important is the ideas and emotions, and that’s what we were looking for. The winning entries this year show an understanding of intangible heritage, of the immaterial – that it’s not about things that you can touch, feel or buy, but something that we get from our family, our history, that we can carry forward.” 

Ms. Bibi Chew who has been active in promoting and contributing to arts education and the contemporary art scene in Malaysia, highlighted the importance of learning one’s background, roots and upbringing.

“Society plays an important role through institutions in opening up the younger generation to their heritage by providing information and guidance, so we hope that Usaha Tegas Heritage, as the only competition with an emphasis on this theme, can continue working well with the education sector in this.” Ms. Bibi Chew said.

Discussing the relationship between art and heritage, Ar. Parama Nathan elaborated, “Art is the soul of our culture and civilization – they cannot be prised apart. Yet today there is a disconnect between art and how we live. A competition like this helps to bring art back into our daily lives by creating awareness of how art used to be so much a part of our traditional lifestyles.” 

For further information on the Usaha Tegas Heritage Art Competition please visit: www.instagram.com/utheritageartcompetition/ or linktr.ee/utheritage.