John Lee Joo-For was a creative polymath whose practice spanned the Performing Arts, Visual Art and Literature across Malaysia and Australia. Exceptionally prodigious and intellectually fecund, John Lee distinguished himself through a non-conformist brand of original thinking that fused curiosity, exploration and experimentation. Seniman Negara Datuk Syed Ahmad Jamal described his multifarious works—rich with autobiographical and historical references—as a fount of symbolism. Many of his major accomplishments were realised during his years in Malaysia, and later during the resurgence of his artistic career, which culminated in a State Retrospective accorded by the Penang State Art Gallery in 2008. This followed an earlier Retrospective (1957–1995) organised by The Art Gallery, Penang, in 1995. John Lee migrated to Australia in 1973 and obtained Australian citizenship in 1975, formally relinquishing his Malaysian citizenship on 12 November 1984. In Australia, where he became a born-again Christian in 1976, he wrote Confucius Sings and staged the successful Christian musical Call of Guadalupe. Both his plays and paintings reflected his uncompromising stance against abortion and euthanasia. His first solo exhibition was held at the British Council, Penang, in 1967. He garnered considerable attention the following year with his metaphysical Oriento-Byzantine art fusion, inspired by the mosaics of St Mark’s. Presented at Frank Sullivan’s Samat Art Gallery in July 1968, the exhibition comprised 33 oil paintings, 25 prints and a series of ceramic works. It coincided with the trajectory of Abdul Latiff Mohidin’s much-vaunted Pago-Pago series. Beyond oil painting, John Lee worked extensively in ceramics and printmaking—including woodcut, monotype, lithograph, etching, linocut and serigraph—as well as watercolour, acrylic, batik and tapestry. He also produced cartoons and sculptures, including murals and three-dimensional plaster works. A prolific playwright, theatre director and producer, he won the Malaysian Playwright of the Year award a record three consecutive times. In Malaysia, he wrote more than 25 English-language plays for Radio Television Malaysia’s Sunday Playhouse, including The Propitious Kidnapping of the Cultured Daughter, The Happening in the Bungalow, and The Flood and the Disappearance. His play The Son of Zen was staged off-Broadway at the Hatch-Billops Studio Players in New York in February 1965. He also co-authored the novel Sara and Sanjiro with his son-in-law, Stephen Gray. Female figures recur prominently in his visual lexicon, etched deeply within his subconscious as emblematic carriers of the human spirit. Often depicted in tandem with their male counterparts—frequently in profile and in confrontation—these figures form a central axis of his imagery. Two enduring motifs in his iconography are the bull and the horse. His youngest brother, Chris, was Malaysia’s first racing commentator, and these animals assume humanistic traits in his work: the horse chivalrous, virile and loyal; the bull aggressive and unyielding. Reflecting his affinity for comics, he also produced autobiographical series exploring personal mannerisms, as well as works addressing the harsh realities of the Japanese Occupation. John Lee received scholarships to study at three British art institutions: Brighton College of Art, Camberwell School of Art and the Royal College of Art. Among his early mentors were artist Donald Graham Sutherland and novelist Iris Murdoch. He taught at Penang Free School, St Xavier’s Institution and the Specialist Teachers’ Training Institute. In Australia, he served at Christ College in Oakleigh, Emmaus College in Burwood and later at the Institute of Catholic Education (now part of Australian Catholic University), where he taught for 15 years before retiring in 1989. He co-founded the Malaysian Art Circle in London, the Thursday Art Group in Penang and the Penang Art Teachers Council. His works were included in Malaysian national exhibitions that travelled to Glasgow, Dublin, London, Berlin, Sydney, France and Italy. Despite the apparent ease with which he created, John Lee maintained that art was born of adversity. “Art is a product of suffering. It sounds poetic, but it’s true. Only one who has lived and suffered can write a great novel, produce a great play, or create a great painting. Comfort breeds fashion and imitation,” he often remarked. Brother Joseph McNally observed: “Here is strength uncommon, a vigorous calligraphic stroke, a lust for colours, a joy in massiveness. Here is versatility unbounded…” Among his exemplary works are The Spirit That Cannot Be Contained, Another Guernica, Sarung Women on Horses, Romance of Country Life, A Right Life and The Power of One—the latter featured on the cover of his 2008 Retrospective catalogue. While his paintings and prints form a substantial legacy, many of his plays survive in audio and video recordings. Tengku Zubaidah Tengku Abu Bakar, known as Bintang, wrote: “He is everything by turn and fluctuates between intellectualism and sensualism. His paintings contain illogical hieroglyphics and sometimes irrelevant symbols… the heavy patina of colours are like reflections caught in the fleeting moment of a bubble’s life.” John Lee Joo-For passed away in Melbourne at the age of 78 from anaplastic thyroid cancer.