Tan Choh Tee

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In 1976, Tan Choh Tee made the decision to leave his career as a book designer and pursue his passion for art professionally. His extensive oeuvre includes numerous paintings that depict the nostalgic beauty of traditional Singaporean neighborhoods, including Chinatown, Trengganu Street, Jalan Besar, and Geylang. In 1984, Tan Choh Tee began teaching at Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts. His artistic career includes nine solo exhibitions and participation in over 50 group exhibitions in countries such as Russia,Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Indonesia.^[7][8][9]

Tan Choh Tee resigned from his job as a book designer to become a full-time artist in 1976 because of a deep frustration with the rapid demolition of Singapore's heritage. Witnessing the country's fast-paced urban redevelopment, he felt an urgent need to capture and "immortalize" old landscapes—particularly in Chinatown^[2]—before they were permanently destroyed by "bulldozers". In the early 1970s, Tan realized that historic buildings and shops were vanishing faster than he could paint them on weekends or in his spare time when he was still working as a book designer. His insistence on painting en plein air (outdoors directly from life) required significant time that his full-time job did not allow. This prompted him to quit his stable career to dedicate himself fully to preserving these scenes on canvas.

Tan Choh Tee began painting scenes outside Singapore during the 1980s, expanding his repertoire from his initial focus on "old Singapore" scenes. He started venturing to Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and China to paint, always using a plein-air approach to capture local scenes and customs. Every now and then, he would still revisit sites within Singapore.

Tan Choh Tee's three-month residency in Paris in 1998 was a pivotal moment in his career, as he was selected as the first alumni of the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) to stay in the school's apartment at the Cité Internationale des Arts.^[10] This no strings attached stint allowed him to immerse himself in the global art scene, meeting artists from around the world and conducting extensive study tours of major French museums.^[11] In the Oral History Interviews conducted by National Archives Singapore, he mentioned that he spent the first two months visiting museums, learning as much as he could from all the masterpieces. Choh Tee was also given a special pass which allowed him to enter the museums freely without having to queue.^[11] The trip reinforced his commitment to plein-air painting—painting outdoors directly from life—and his ability to capture fleeting light and atmosphere using his signature realist-impressionist style. Around 15 works emerged from this trip^[10], and prominent pieces from this period include River Seine, Paris (1998) and Untitled (View of the Notre Dame) (1998), both of which demonstrate his mastery of layered gestural brushwork and vibrant, emotive color blocks. ^{[12] [13]} This international exposure contributed significantly to his artistic prestige, preceding his receipt of the Cultural Medallion in 2006.

Little is known about Tan Choh Tee's trip to Paris in 2025, except that it was a trip sponsored by a collector, and that the artist paid a visit to the Singapore Embassy in Paris at the start of the trip.

In June 2024, Choh Tee stayed at the residence of a long-time Chinese collector in Germany and created a series of oil paintings. The creation was accidental as the artist's original intention of the trip was a vacation. However, Choh Tee found inspiration in the scenery that he encountered at Germany, and decided to paint the scenes with locally bought canvases and oil paints. This resulted in eight masterpieces - two of which were given to the host in Germany. The remaining six were brought back to Singapore as the showpieces of an exhibition. These six painting were bought by two Singaporean collectors even before the exhibition started. ^[6]

Tan Choh Tee received the Cultural Medallion for Visual Arts in 2006.^[8][14] His artworks are featured in prestigious collections such as the National Museum of Singapore, the Brunei Museum, several other art galleries^[15] and private institutions, with UOB holding one of the largest collections with around 28 pieces. ^[16]