Loman Eng

By Ken Hall

It might be said that Loman Eng is a product of his environment - his artistic environment, that is.

The Chinese-born painter and portrait artist has studied under four masters, each one infusing in Eng a different set of styles and disciplines. By the time he and his wife, Petula, also an artist, immigrated from Hong Kong to the United States in the 1970's, Eng had absorbed several lifetimes' worth of talent from as many different teachers.

As the disparate representational works on these pages show, Eng is adept at many different artistic expressions. Some are classical and exhibit rigorous traditional methods. Others are more free-form and lively. Some have rich colors and are very complex. Others have few colors and are simple.

"Most important," he said, "all of my portraits are full of emotions and can communicate the subjects' feelings with the viewers. The main purpose of creating art is the communication between artist and viewer. Through my art, I tell how I see or feel different things."

To understand and appreciate this multi-faceted artist, it is important to learn about his past. Loman Eng was born in China and raised in the Portugese colony of Macao, a small peninsula jutting off the southern edge of China, west of Hong Kong .

Eng was interested in art from a very young age, and at age 8 his father sent him to a studio to learn more about Chinese painting and calligraphy. By the fifth grade, he'd had his own solo show, and it was around that time he was introduced to his first master in Western art.

"He graduated from an art college in China," Eng said, "but also went on to study Western art in Europe - where he lived in France and England for three decades - and the United States, where he lived for several years before returning to Macao to retire."

Eng's first year under this man was simple and straightforward: he drew and mixed colors for him. "We grinded our own paint and made almost everything that we needed," he said. "If he needed a certain color for a painting, I was given only a few minutes to produce exactly what he wanted. If not, I was punished."

Despite the rigidity and discipline, Eng described that era of his training as "one of my most important learning periods. My master was a very slow painter, very attentive to detail. And because of that, I also became a slow painter, very attentive to detail."

Eng then absorbed the influence of the artists who had influenced his second teacher: European masters such as William Bouguereau, Frank Cowper, Frederic Leighton, Lawrence Alma-Tadema and John Waterhouse. And like his master, who specialized in women's portraits, that became Eng's specialty, too.

A second master, like the first, "taught me to be absolutely disciplined," while a third master "taught me how to paint flowers" and a fourth "introduced me to landscape and impressionism." Masters three and four encouraged Eng to let go a little, be more adventuresome.

"From these last two," he said, "I learned to carefully plan my paintings, but at the same time never stop exploring new techniques and creating new methods." Remarkably, Eng was able to pay for both his and his wife's undergraduate and graduate studies by selling art. His undergraduate degree is in civil engineering, with a background in architecture and design.

Eng's progression in mediums was first Chinese ink and watercolors, then oil, tempera, acrylic, pastel and charcoal. While still in high school, he sold one of his charcoal and pastel portraits (titled "Maria") to the Cardinal of Macao, and still another to the editor of a local newspaper, who described it as the best he'd seen in decades.

Fueled by this encouragement, Eng became intensely interested in charcoal portraits, in addition to oils. "I paint from both live models and photographs, and in many different styles," he said. "I usually briefly sketch and make notes of what I see, especially with regard to colors and small details. Other times, I register what I see in my mind."

A drawback, Eng said, is that images often linger in his mind and won't leave him until a painting is finally done. "It's like a song that runs through your mind when you're trying to go to sleep," he said. "It just won't go away, no matter how hard you try to shake it off."

Eng said he becomes very attached to his models. "If I can't express their feelings, I won't finish the painting, regardless of how much work I've poured into it. I never force myself to finish any portrait within a certain amount of time. I take as much time as it requires. One charcoal portrait took me twelve years to complete, from 1982-1994."

The art writer Denise Richer once said of Eng's charcoal portraits, "They're breathtaking. He can express color in black and white. He gets the mood. They seem almost living, capturing emotion, mood and attitude in black and white form."

Eng and his wife live in Ithaca, N.Y., in the Finger Lakes region. The area is surrounded by the beauty of nature - flowers, landscapes, waterfalls - offering the couple vast opportunities for landscape art. Petula, especially, has become a wonderful landscape and floral painter; look for her work in an upcoming issue.

The Engs co-wrote a book titled "Collecting American Belleek" (Schiffer Publishing Co., 2003). Loman has an MBA degree from an Ivy League school and has working experience in jewelry, doll and fashion design. He has been a full-time artist for several years. Eng is currently a member of the Portrait Society of America.

To learn more about the art of Loman Eng, or to inquire about a purchase or commission, you may visit his websites (www.engsart.com and www.lakefrontgallery.com), e-mail him at leng@lightlink.com, or call (607) 256-8774. His address is 407 Taughannock Blvd., Ithaca, NY 14850.