The vase near the edge of a classic-looking display table looks antique, but is it? How can one tell? By its material, faience, manufacturer’s markings or other provenance? Are they Etruscan, Chinese, Japanese, Khmer or Dutch, or a Wedgwood? Interestingly, Ai Weiwei performed the act of ‘Dropping A Han Dynasty Urn’ with some doubting if it was indeed what it was said to be, especially after Ai Weiwei had desecrating it by painting over it. But Ahmad Zakii Anwar is no iconoclast. His still-life painting is aimed at a polished finish with a harmony of the objet de vertu and the table against a smooth ash-grey wall. There were his textured sofa still-lifes and his more saucy fruit-and-object still-lifes. After graduating with Graphic Design from the Mara Institute of Technology in 1977, Ahmad Zakii had a lucrative career in Advertising but decided to switch to Fine Art. He was an immediate hit with his cool Smokers Series (1997) and his dark vignettes of urban realism. A series of significant solos abroad and at home led to his major mid-career survey exhibition called Disclosure at Galeri Petronas, Kuala Lumpur, in 2008. His solos abroad include Presence (New York, 1999); Shadowland (Hong Kong, 2001); Sublimal (The Philippines and also Thailand, 2006); Baik Art (South Korea, 2013); in Indonesia – Borobudur, Amanjiwa, Arangbali (2004), Kota Sunyi (2007), Nafsu (2010); and in Singapore – Paintings Drawings and Prints 1991-2007 (2007), Bones & Sinews (2011), Being (2009), Primordial Dream (2005) and Distant Gamelan (1981). His Kuala Lumpur solos include Kota Sepi (VWFA, 2012), Interpreter of Desires (Taksu, 2003) and Icons (Richard Koh FA, 2005).