Hasanul Isyraf Idris – Bintang Hijau

Richard Koh Fine Art (Singapore) is delighted to present Bintang Hijau, a solo exhibition by Malaysian artist Hasanul Isyraf Idris (b.1978), held in conjunction with Singapore Art Week 2026.

Bintang Hijau takes its title from the permanent forest reserve located in Selama, Perak, one of the poorest regions in Malaysia, bordering the Kulim High-Tech Industrial Park and the Titiwangsa mountain range. It is here that Hasanul is currently building his studio, and from this landscape the works in this exhibition emerge.

Rooted in sustained observation, Bintang Hijau reflects Hasanul’s ongoing engagement with the natural environment, where he documents, collects, and archives fragments of the land—ranging from insects and birds to fish and plant life. Among his earliest and most delicate materials is pollen from the bitter bean (petai) tree, a native species resilient amid encroaching industrial development. Hasanul preserves the pollen and studies it further through scientific processes, merging the fields of ecology, botany, and art.

This body of work manifests as a visual diary that maps the transition of the landscape, where drawings, notes, and collected materials converge into forms of care and attention. In Hasanul’s hands, the unseen life of the forest—its fragility, persistence, and memory—becomes a subject of contemplation. Bintang Hijau not only encapsulates a personal journey of discovery but also reflects broader ecological shifts unfolding across Malaysia’s rapidly changing terrains.

HASANUL ISYRAF IDRIS (b.1978, Perak, Malaysia) was trained at Mara University of Technology (UiTM), Perak, Malaysia and is presently based in Penang.

His practice spans a variety of media, including painting, drawing, installation, video work, and sculpture. His works typically manifest hybridity of fictional and surreal iconography drawn from the personal invention as from a melange of pop cultural references, such as comic books, science fiction, street art, and film. He personifies his personal struggles as an artist with strange characters and creatures that inhabit his invented universes.