Before the Association had a constitution or a letterhead, it had a conversation in the newspaper. The clippings gathered here are the earliest public record of the South-East Asia Art Association — the moment a circle of painters announced itself to the region, in ink on newsprint. 在协会拥有章程与信笺之前，它先有的是报纸上的一场对话。 此处所辑录的剪报，是东南亚美术协会最早的公开记录——一群画家以报端的 油墨，向整个区域宣告自身存在的时刻。
In the closing months of 1970, a Singapore newspaper reporter went to see the painter Yeh Chi Wei to ask a simple question: why start another art society? His answer — printed in the Nanyang Siang Pau on 17 November 1970 — is the earliest full account we have of what would become the South-East Asia Art Association. 1970 年岁末，新加坡一位报社记者前往拜访画家叶之威， 提出一个朴素的问题：为何还要另起一个美术团体？他的回答——刊于 1970 年 11 月 17 日的《南洋商报》——是我们所能找到、关于日后东南亚美术协会 最早的完整叙述。
The Association, Yeh explained, was not a rival to the existing art bodies but a continuation of the Ten People Art Exhibition circle that had painted together through the preceding decade. Its purpose reached beyond Singapore: to deepen artistic exchange across South-East Asia, to welcome visiting painters, and to give the region's artists a shared home. Yeh spoke of his own long journeys — through India, Cambodia, Sarawak and Kelantan — as the travels that had shaped that outlook, and of art itself as a matter of ideals rather than of a single, unchanging picture. 叶之威解释说，这个协会并非要与既有的美术团体分庭抗礼， 而是过去十年间共同作画的《十人画展》群体的延续。它的宗旨超越新加坡： 深化东南亚各地的艺术交流，欢迎访问画家，为区域内的艺术家提供一个共同的家园。 叶之威谈及自己远赴印度、柬埔寨、砂拉越与吉兰丹的漫长游历——正是这些旅程 塑造了这样的视野；他也谈到，艺术本身关乎理想，而不是一幅一成不变的画。
Within months the promise became action. On 1 February 1971 the Sin Chew Jit Poh carried the announcement of the Association's first major undertaking — a students' art competition spanning the region — and by May the paper was reporting the warm response it had drawn from schools near and far. Read in sequence, the three clippings below trace a society moving from idea to institution in the space of a single year. 数月之间，承诺化为行动。1971 年 2 月 1 日，《星洲日报》 刊出协会首项重大计划的公告——一场横跨区域的学生美术比赛；至五月，该报 已在报道这项比赛在远近学校间所获得的热烈反响。若依次阅读以下三则剪报， 便可看见一个社群如何在短短一年之内，从一个念头走向一个机构。
An interview with the painter Yeh Chi Wei, reported by Yin Lei. Yeh sets out the Association's reason for being — not another stove lit for its own sake, but a body to nurture local art and to knit together the painters of the region. He recalls the expeditions that formed him — India in 1961, Cambodia in 1962, Sarawak in 1968, Kelantan in 1970 — and looks ahead to a formal founding, a regional gathering of artists, and an exhibition the following year. 对画家叶之威的专访，记者尹雷报道。叶之威阐明协会存在的理由—— 并非为一己而另起炉灶，而是要培育本地美术、将区域内的画家联结起来。 他回忆起塑造了自己的历次远行——1961 年的印度、1962 年的柬埔寨、 1968 年的砂拉越、1970 年的吉兰丹——并展望翌年的正式成立、 一场区域艺术家的聚会，以及一次展览。
Publication · Nanyang Siang Pau, Singapore News, page 4刊物 · 《南洋商报》新加坡新闻 第四版
The Association's first major project, launched jointly with the Nanyang University Art Society and Sin Chew Jit Poh. Open to college and secondary students in two divisions, across Western painting and Chinese ink, the competition set out to raise standards and to foster friendship among young artists of the region. Entries opened on this day; the winning works were to be exhibited at Victoria Memorial Hall and gathered in a commemorative special issue. 协会的首项重大计划，与南洋大学美术协会及《星洲日报》联合主办。 比赛面向大专与中学学生，分为两组，涵盖西洋画与中国水墨， 旨在提高水准、增进区域内青年艺术家之间的友谊。收件自本日起； 得奖作品将在维多利亚纪念堂展出，并辑入纪念特刊。
Judging panel included Yeh Chi Wei, Liu Kang, Chen Chong Swee, Chen Jen Hao, Choo Keng Kwang, Lim Tze Peng and Lee Man Fong, among others.评判委员会成员包括叶之威、刘抗、陈宗瑞、陈人浩、朱庆光、林子平、李曼峰等。
Three months on, the paper reports a strong and growing response to the competition from schools across the region, with the closing date set for the end of June. The notice restates the divisions, the permitted media and sizes, and the prizes, and reaffirms that selected works would be shown to the public and preserved in print — a young society's first act of collective record-keeping. 三个月后，该报报道这项比赛在区域各地学校间获得了热烈而日渐扩大的 反响，收件日期定于六月底截止。公告重申了组别、准许的媒材与尺寸以及奖项， 并再次确认入选作品将向公众展出、以印刷形式保存下来——这是一个年轻社群 首次以集体之力，为自己留存记录。
Correspondence · South-East Asia Art Association, 24 Paya Lebar Street, Singapore通讯处 · 东南亚美术协会，新加坡巴耶利峇律 24 号
The Association keeps its founding-era press materials, catalogues and photographs in Singapore. Researchers, curators and collectors may write to archive@seaaa.sg. 协会将创会时期的新闻资料、图录与照片存于新加坡。 研究者、策展人与藏家可来函 archive@seaaa.sg。
Read the fuller story of the Association's five decades, or see the exhibitions that carry it forward.阅读协会五十年更完整的故事，或查看延续这一历程的历次展览。
Read Our History阅读会史