Kok Yew Puah, as he is more popularly known with his surname pushed behind, plays on the ironic juxtapose and contrast of Tradition and Change, and the inroads of development on ordinary life. In this, Klang Pop, if you like, a man tilts his neck backwards as a jet plane flies past. The bottom's-up angling is dizzying. One, making the plane looks as if it is flying exceptionally low and the other of the man, looking up with the front neck rendered exaggeratingly large as if he suffered from thyroid, probably to add a touch humour. All the background is cerulean blue, and the picture, which brings to mind the 1966 folk song by John Denver, Leaving On A Jet Plane, is framed in an air-mail envelope. The man, probably a country lad, looks up in awe and with a little trepidation, and probably has never travelled in a plane before, as budget travel like AirAsia started only in November 1996. This is also a subtle contrast between Man and Machine, with the plane stealthily creeping in from the top left and seen as a behemoth. Kok Yew Puah studied Painting and Printmaking at the Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne, Australia (1966-1972). His career with a solo at the Samat Art Gallery in 1973, looked promising with abstract Pop graphics using silkscreen, but he had to put his art in the back-burner to concentrate on developing the family chilli-sauce business. A decade and a half later, he made a comeback painting figures with environmental issues and notions of identity, in an exhibition simply entitled, Kok Yew Puah: 1985-1993. He had bad news and good news in 1994. His business failed, but his entry for the Philip Morris Asean Art Awards was adjudged 2nd in the national final, with the Asean finals being held in Singapore. He was one of the five Malaysian winners again the next year, with the Asean final held in Jakarta, Indonesia. He was again one of the five Malaysian winners of the contest the next year. In 1997, he held his second and last solo, Klang And Beyond. Ilham Gallery organised Kok Yew Puah: Portrait Of A Malaysian Artist from October 2021 to April 2022.