Tracing Stillness (Menjejak Hening)

Wei-Ling Gallery is pleased to present Tracing Stillness (Menjejak Hening), the tenth solo exhibition by Malaysian artist Hamidi Hadi. The exhibition brings together a recent body of work shaped through endurance, repetition, and sustained physical engagement with material. For more than two decades, Hamidi has developed a practice grounded in surface, density, and the weight of accumulated gestures. In this new series, the work turns toward rupture. Rather than building through addition, the surface is folded, torn, peeled, and split until it yields.

The process is uncompromising. Hamidi speaks of the physical strain demanded by each canvas, from the force required to separate layers to the moments when resistance overwhelms the body. Injuries sometimes occur as layers refuse to part. These actions leave visible records. Torn edges, exposed strata, and stressed surfaces hold the memory of effort, turning the canvas into a site where the body’s exertion is registered.

No strict method governs the series. Hamidi describes each work as having its own temperament. Some surfaces resist for long periods, others open suddenly. Decisions are made in response to what the material allows. Authority remains unsettled, shifting as the negotiation unfolds. The painting is neither fully controlled nor fully surrendered. It lands somewhere in between.

Fracture occupies a central place within the exhibition. For Hamidi, tearing and breaking the surface does not signal destruction. He speaks of these moments as openings, places where light enters and attention slows. This shift relates to an interior journey, where physical rupture intersects with the fragility of the human body. The work carries both corporeal and spiritual weight. It gestures toward the finite condition of the body while creating space for what cannot be held in material form.

Various elements recur throughout the series. Industrial paint absorbs pressure unpredictably. Darkened layers collapse or part. Numerical markings linger like remnants of counting or measuring. These traces recall systems that structure modern life. They never fully settle into fixed meanings. Instead, they remain embedded, partially obscured beneath the surface.

In several works, small photographic figures appear along edges or between split canvases. Their scale is modest and vulnerable. Positioned between surfaces under tension, they suggest a human presence suspended between matter and light, strain and release. The figure does not claim authority. It waits.
Tracing Stillness (Menjejak Hening) moves toward quiet without arriving at resolution. Stillness develops gradually, shaped through force, hesitation, and moments of pause. The works invite viewers to slow down and stay with what unfolds through fracture rather than seek closure. What emerges is less a statement than an attentiveness to the conditions that make reflection possible.

Tracing Stillness (Menjejak Hening) is featured at Wei-Ling Gallery from 4 February – 28 March 2026.

Wei-Ling Gallery is located at No 8, Jalan Scott, Brickfields, 50470 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Admission hours are Tuesday – Friday 10am – 6pm, Saturday 10am – 5pm. Exhibition is open by appointment only. For appointments and further assistance, please contact +60322601106 or e-mail siewboon@weiling-gallery.com

ABOUT THE ARTIST
HAMIDI HADI (B. 1971)

Hamidi Hadi is regarded as one of the most prominent abstract artists of his generation, and is well-known for his experimental and explorative use of material. Over the years, his practice has formally migrated from pictorial representation of the objective world, into abstraction and the synthesis of complex materials and methods, to describe his emotional and spiritual responses to the world.

He investigates the natural phenomenon of the world and uses this in his imaginary landscapes, through the application of industrial paint, resin, wax, linseed oil and charcoal in layers, allowing gravity and movement, to create surface tension. As we contemplate his abstract works, we begin to connect the reference points that give us clues to the artist’s inner landscape, and his contemplation of his place in the world.

Hamidi Hadi received the UOB Painting of the Year (Malaysia) – Bronze Award, Established Artist Category in 2018, the Bank Negara’s Kijang Award in 2004 and the Philip Morris ASEAN Biennale Art Award in 2000. His works have also been collected by both public and private institutions and corporations. Amongst them are the Grand Hyatt Kuala Lumpur, Setia Berhad, and the National Art Gallery of Malaysia. He has exhibited extensively both within Malaysia and on international platforms, with exhibitions in Singapore, Hong Kong, Indonesia, China, the Philippines and the United Kingdom.