Cheong Soo Pieng (simplified Chinese: 钟泗宾; traditional Chinese: 鍾泗賓; pinyin: Zhōng Sì Bīn; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Tsing Sì-pin) was a Singaporean artist who was a pioneer of the Nanyang art style, and a driving force to the development of Modernism in visual art in the early 20th-century Singapore.
He was also known for his signature depiction of Southeast Asian indigenous tribal people with elongated limbs and torso, almond-shaped faces and eyes in his paintings.
In 1936 Cheong graduated and attended Xinhua Academy of Fine Art in Shanghai for further studies, only to have his education cut short with the breakout of the Sino-Japanese War and the school destroyed by Japanese invaders in 1938.
In 1945 Cheong left Mainland China for Hong Kong and relocated to Singapore in late 1946 where he would be a lecturer at the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts for the next 20 years.
[1] In 1955 Cheong Soo Pieng, along with five other artists Chen Wen Hsi, Chen Chong Swee, Lim Hak Tai, Tay Wee Koh, and Suri bin Mohyani were invited to showcase their artworks in England, funded by fellow artist and arts patron Ho Kok Hoe.