Influence of Local Culture on the Identity of Malaysian Portrait Painting

Abstract

This study focuses on the chronology of local cultural themes that were selected from Malaysian portrait paintings. All the artworks were chosen from the permanent Kuala Lumpur National Art Gallery collection. The process was supported with visits and observations, where the process of record was identified and followed with the categorization of themes. All the artworks shared individual, economic, social, and family themes, which became the priorities of the painters. The whole theme from this classification represented the cultural identity and became the most important theme for local painters in this country after it achieved independence. Keywords: Local Culture; Identity; Malaysian Portraiture. eISSN 2514-7528 ©2022. The Authors. Published for AMER & cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour StudiesCollege of Built Environment, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/jabs.v7i22.412