14 Facts About Ngwe Gaing

Ngwe Gaing was a Burmese artist who worked in both oil and watercolor.

Ngwe Gaing had great influence on the next generation of artists, and his works are now highly sought after.

Ngwe Gaing was initially self-taught and then improved his skills via an American correspondence painting course.

Ngwe Gaing was forced to work at a number of menial jobs until he was able to support himself as an artist.

Ngwe Gaing was first taught by Po Aung and later by Ba Ohn and Ba Sein, finally becoming a pupil of the famous artist Ba Nyan, after Ba Nyan returned from England in 1930.

Ngwe Gaing was not a formal live-in apprentice of Ba Nyan, rather studying with Ba Nyan on weekends in his free time.

Ngwe Gaing was a prolific and versatile painter who worked in both oil and watercolour, and he did pencil drawings.

Ngwe Gaing painted stage settings for films on traditional themes before the war, and when there was a vogue for stage plays after World War II, he painted stage settings for the makeshift Myaing Theatre in the Kandawgyi Park.

Ngwe Gaing painted portraits of notable people such as President Ba U, film star Wah Wah Win Shwe and film director Shumawa U Kyaw.

Ngwe Gaing traveled widely in Burma to find subjects, making sketches that he would later paint in oils or watercolours, often scenes of the daily life of ordinary people and particularly portraits of Burma's many ethnic peoples.

Ngwe Gaing's last work was a series of scenes from the Jatakas for the "Shwe Mokhti" pagoda in Dawei, where they hang in the covered passageways to the pagoda.

Works by Ngwe Gaing are held in the Singapore Art Museum and other prominent regional collections.

Ngwe Gaing is considered one of the great masters of modern Burmese painting.

Ngwe Gaing made an outstanding contribution through his versatility, technical skill and influence on a generation of Burmese painters.