Khin Maung (Bank) was born in 1910 at Tantse (တန့်ဆည်), Shwebo District, the second son of a merchant, and became interested in painting at an early age.
[4] In Southeast Asian terms, this would roughly put him on par in time with painters such as Affandi in Indonesia, who were turning to modernistic painting during the same decade.
[4][5] The most provocative aspect of Khin Maung's work, however, is that in searching for a modernistic idiom which would suit Burma and not disenchant the conservative tendencies of Burmese culture, he also deeply sought inspiration from the mural painting of Bagan,[4] which was 800 years or so old.
This leap in thought was rather brilliant, for it revealed to Burmese painters who were interested in modernising stagnant forms of painting in Burma, namely naturalism and realism, that they did not have to wholly mimic or entirely borrow from the outside world to do so.
[4] They could find plenty of inspiration for figurative or non-figurative abstraction in the history of Burmese art itself, in the ruins at Bagan.