EXHIBITION

“Hang Den” carries the intimacy of language in its title, a playful fusion of local slang meaning “you and me.” Hang is Penang dialect for “you,” while den is Negeri Sembilan dialect for “I.” The title gestures to Kide’s personal story, recalling his relationship with his wife, Ika, whom he first met in her hometown of Penang (on the northwest coast of Peninsular Malaysia), while he hails from Negeri Sembilan (in the central southern region of Peninsular Malaysia). Drawing from its autobiographical reference, the title situates the exhibition within memory, place, and human experience, tracing the ties between personal history and collective culture.

The works in this exhibition are born from a dialogue with Penang’s 1960s and 70s aesthetic, a period that Kide has long admired for its music, fashion, and visual sensibilities. He excavates this era through photographs, postcards, archival materials, and the lived experiences of the city today, listening closely to conversations in kopitiams, the gestures of neighbourhood shops, and the cadences of local streets. Through this practice, Kide reflects on how history, memory, and place shape contemporary experience.

Returning after the restrictions of 2020, “Hang Den” presents a long-awaited second chance to experience Kide’s work in its full breadth, after the previous exhibition was curtailed by the pandemic. The show reads as a love letter to Penang, with its communities, quirks, and enduring spirit, articulating the intimacy of everyday life as a form of historical consciousness. Kide’s paintings remain vivid, playful, and deeply human, recalling our own memories and opening up a renewed experience of the city through the attentive, imaginative gaze of one of Malaysia’s most compelling chroniclers of place and experience.