Leon Lim (born in Kedah, Malaysia) is an artist, designer and photographer who was schooled in Kedah and Penang and lives in New York City. He has been profoundly deaf since birth and his deafness developed his strong sense of seeing. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Rochester Institute of Technology, New York. He was also known as "a 14-year-old boy who lived alone in the apartment". Recently, Lim competed in the second season of the Bravo television network's reality television series Work of Art: The Next Great Artist.[1]
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As a child, Lim discovered colorful prints covered on music cassettes, which brought him into the art world. Lim was attracted to watercolor, pastel and drawing when he participated many art competitions through his primary school in Kedah, Malaysia and received several awards.
In 1992, Lim moved to Penang, Malaysia for high school, Federation School for the Deaf (presently known as SMK Pendidikan Khas Persekutuan). Lim lived alone in the three-bedroom apartment at the age of 14. Living alone at this tender age afforded Lim the time to build his own world free of the barriers that come with the need to hear sound. His apartment, where he lived alone for the past seven years, gave Lim an opportunity to advance his life and knowledge by performing three family roles - father, mother and teenager - at the same time. "That experience really gave me a sense of responsibility for my life and the real world. I was losing my sense of humanity when people tried to cure my ears during my childhood,” Lim said.
Residing in Penang, Lim was inspired by the old town, George Town, Penang to develop his keen interest in exploring on the story of Francis Light, the founder of the British colony of Penang and identifying the local aesthetics of the historic Colonial old buildings. Lim's newfound independence in Penang also gave him the opportunity to cultivate his artistic talents. Leonardo da Vinci was Lim's biggest inspiration when he was young.
After Lim graduated from his high school in 1997, he realized that his pre-adulthood life in Malaysia or Asia was hopeless. Lim had long searched for scholarship opportunities on the Internet for higher education in the United States (USA) and submitted several letters to international organizations for educational finance while Lim was taking a De Montfort University of United Kingdom program at the Equator Academy of Artin Penang.
After more than two years, Lim received a full five-year scholarship from USA and Japan. Lim decided to attend Rochester Institute of Technology without his parents' permission. Lim selected Rochester Institute of Technology because the university has 1,300 deaf students, 14,500 hearing students and more than 150 American Sign Language interpreters. While studying at RIT, Lim discovered his passion for design, photography, film and architecture. After his graduation from RIT, Lim settled in New York City, which was his childhood dream before coming to USA for his art career.
In 1998, Lim created his first sculptural installation, The Recycled Head Anatomy with old objects such as bulbs, broken glasses, steel cans, toys, and electronic and plastic media found around the streets of George Town. That sculpture allowed Lim understand about the possibility of transformation and how one cultural object or gesture may turn into another.
In 1999, Lim reached out to various organizations and newspapers for a grant to do his first art project, “What is in the Deaf’s Mind?” with the help of his former teacher, Vicky Teoh. Teoh had spoken to several representatives of the companies by phone for Lim. He received three sponsors, including 500 cans of acrylic colors from the Hai Kuang Sdn. Bhd, a manufacturer of Pelaka paints; old newspapers and grants from the two local newspapers, The Star (Malaysia) and The Sun (Malaysia). Lim directed 80 deaf students of ages 8–16 to make a big canvas by using old newspapers and to paint their faces and bodies to express their own worlds onto canvas.
Lim has been creating works ranging from paintings and sculptures to interior/architectural models and graphic design to multimedia and art installations and photographs. The solo voyager, who has traveled to more than 33 countries worldwide, often explores themes of heritage preservation, social segregation, mortality, interactive communication, and the politics of identity and culture. His voyages inspired his work which is an investigation of the diversity of human expression, built environment, sociological experience, and cross-cultural experience.
In addition to his artistic pursuits, Lim has participated in heritage-conservation research and gave a lecture of "George Town Contemporary" at Penang Heritage Centre, George Town, Penang (Pusat Warisan Pulau Pinang) with the help of Khoo Salma. Also, Lim served as an Art Director and Set Designer in US-based film production for short movies.
Lim continues working on his creative installations for further exhibitions in Asia and Europe. Lim's recent multimedia installation has been exhibited internationally at Seoul's Total Museum of Contemporary Art, South Korea in July 2008 and Beijing's CAFA Art Museum, China in August 2009. His works have been exhibited at galleries such as the John F. Kennedy Center, Washington DC, the World Financial Center, New York City, Bevier Gallery, Rochester NY and Gallery R, Rochester NY.
Lim was commissioned in 2008 to create a permanent art installation, The 3(656) for a study lounge in the new center at Rochester Institute of Technology. The installation is an introduction of Lim's inspiration from the unknown history from the dream of building a college to the reality of a college to Lim's arrival. The grand opening of the installation was launched on May 2008.
Lim is one of 17 selected artists from New York City, (including Artist Chuck Close) featured in the 2009 calendar for the Mayor of New York City. Bank of America, Bank of America's Disability Affinity Group, Pitney Bowes and Williams Lea donated their time and effort to help make the calendar a reality.
On June 2010, Lim’s art installations, Silent Story and Discommunicativeness which were exhibited in Washington DC, New York, and Beijing, were selected again to be part of the inaugural exhibition of the 5th Busan Media Festival in Busan, the second largest city in South Korea. Busan is the home of the Busan Biennale, a well renowned international contemporary art biennale.
On July 2010, Lim was commissioned by the Penang State Government, George Town World Heritage Incorporated, and Penang Global Tourism, to create a new site-specific, public art installation, The Last Chairs for the George Town Festival 2010 inaugurated in conjunction with the UNESCO World Heritage Site's second anniversary. The installation, The Last Chairswas a living work created by the nature of people's participation in and the influence of urban culture today, which is brought together through a collection of hundreds of irreplaceable wooden chairs that were built, placed, or found originally in the neighborhoods of George Town. Before creating his installation, the chairs that are damaged, ignored, and thrown on the streets of George Town, caught Lim's interest and perception in 1997. After 13 years, Lim decided to use the chairs for his exhibition. The chairs are a symbol of brutality - the mess of society. This exhibition marked Penang’s first public art in its new chapter on Contemporary Art in George Town as well as Lim's first exhibition in his native homeland of Malaysia, after his works have been exhibited in several other countries.
Lim completed the second season of Work of Art: The Next Great Artist. Lim was chosen for Prestige Magazine's November-issue cover for The Art Issue in 2011.
In an interview with New Straits Times, one of the major Malaysian newspapers, Lim quoted,
People generally cannot see beyond a deaf person's physical handicap. Many of them have hidden talent. All that is required is a little prodding, a push. Give them a little encouragement. They are not as disabled as you might think.
In other major newspaper in Korea, Cathy Rose A. Garcia, reporter of The Korea Times, wrote,
Being deaf should not be seen as a hindrance to pursuing one's dreams ― if anyone is living proof of this, it is deaf Malaysian artist Leon Lim.