Sarkasi (Tzee) Said Sold at Auction Prices

b. 1940 -

Sarkasi bin Said (b. 27 March 1940, Singapore–), who goes by the artist name Tzee, is an internationally renowned Singaporean batik painter.1 The artist is noted for his unconventional use of a wax-resisting technique for batik painting, his bold use of colours and his frequent depictions of nature.2 In May 2003, Sarkasi’s 103-metre batik painting set a Guinness World Record for the world’s longest batik painting.

As his parents were separated when he was just three years old, Sarkasi was raised by his grandparents. His passion for art was sparked by a treasured hand-made toy aeroplane from his grandfather for his fifth or sixth birthday. Its construction without the use of nails impressed the young Sarkasi. It made Sarkasi appreciate the joys of hand-made works of beauty, and he aimed to accomplish the same with his paintings.

Sarkasi’s exposure to batik art came during his formative years and was a result of helping his grandmother who sold batik cloth as an extra form of income.10 However, he began to develop a serious interest in the art form after he saw an Italian artist’s exhibition in a gallery in Singapore in the 1960s. He noticed that the foreign artist was using a technique that was a traditional art form in the region.11 As a Javanese, Sarkasi felt that it was important that he should return to his cultural roots, and focus on batik art because of its significance in Malay culture. He was inspired by the wax-resisting or wax-dyeing batik painting technique instead of both water colours and oil for his paintings.

To deepen his knowledge and understanding of batik art, Sarkasi travelled extensively in the region so that he could learn from the batik printing centres. His stay at Karang Malang was one of the personal highlights of his sojourns to Indonesia, as it was his grandparents’ hometown. On the same trip, Sarkasi was also able to study under Pak Aznam Effendy, a painter-teacher at Yayasan Akademi Senipura Nasional in Jakarta.