D'hange Yammanee

Multi Award Winning Artist

Thursday 21st September 2023

D'hange Yammanee was born in Bangkok, Thailand, in 1947; moved to live in Sydney, Australia in 1976, and settled down in Western Australia in 1986

D’hange is a self-taught artist who works in Oil, Watercolour, and pastel.

He was inspired by Claude Monet and Arthur Streeton’s works and followed their path by going out Plein Air painting every day on his own after dropping off his children at school. For more than five years, he observed and studied the effect of light and atmosphere in the landscape at different times of the day and different seasons of the year, which led him to discover and understand the core concept of nature that inspired him to create his unique system on how to capture the illusion of light and atmosphere in the simple, easy to understand and easy to apply.

He also loves painting portraits; after his disappointment with the evening classes at the Royal Art Society in Sydney, he decided to study independently from books (there was no internet at that time). he visited the Art Gallery of NSW every weekend to observe paintings of the old master, went through trial and error and disappointment and gave up painting five or six times in the process before he finally understood what painting was all about and focused on practising new skill on his weak points that need to develop.

His persistence paid off, and his works have finally been recognized.

In 1986, he won Best Representational with his portrait of Freeman of Albany, Mrs. Mary Thomson, Albany Art Award, and Albany, WA.

In 1987, he was a finalist in Doug Moran National Portrait Price (Portrait of Robert Juniper)

He was commissioned to paint four of the freemen of the City of Stirling, two of the Mayor of the City of South Perth, and the bird-man Eric Singleton (Bird sanctuary founder) by the City of Bayswater.

All commissioned portraits were painted from life, including a portrait of Robert Juniper and Freeman of Albany, Mrs. Mary Thomson.

In 2002, he was selected to represent WA in Italy as a Visual Artist Exchange Programme with AM International, to paint and exhibit in the town of Bivongi, Calabria, Italy.

He has won over sixty-five Art prizes for his Landscapes and Portraits. (Plein Air, Oil, Watercolour, and Pastel.)

From 2008 to 2020, he stopped competing. He devoted his time to full-time teaching, sharing the painting technique he created at many different art schools, from Claremont School of Arts, Melville Community Art Centre, Midland Art Centre, YMCA Morley, private tuition and through demonstration and workshops at Art Society around Perth.

Many of D’hange’s students who never painted before in their lives have fulfilled their dreams. Manny’s committed students have their works recognized and are excited when they win awards and sell their paintings; some become full-time artists, and so on.

His knowledge and skills led him to be part of the judge's panel for the Lester Portrait Prize in WA for three years.

He also judges for the annual art exhibition for many Art Societies around Perth.

One of the many highlights of D’hange’s painting journey was when he received a phone call from the assistant of Her Majesty Sultan of Johor Malaysia, who wanted to come to visit D'hange’s Studio and gallery while she was in Perth (her son was studying in Perth). She came and purchased four paintings for her collection.

Other Corporate collections are Television Network channel 7 WA, Thai Airway International and Bennet & Co, Barristers & Solicitors. Tunku Osmond (Minister of Environment Malaysia.)

His paintings are also in collections of many towns and cities in Perth, WA, and worldwide, such as in the USA, Ireland, England, Italy, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Thailand, South Africa, Malaysia, Singapore and France.

D’hange was a member of the WA Society of Arts in 1987 and was on a committee for a year or two; during that time, he painted the portrait of President Jo Mc Mullan 1987 (the painting is now in the collection of her family)

He received Highly commended at the WA Society of Arts Annual Exhibition WA in 1987 and 1988 (Oil). Won first prize in 1989 (watercolour) and first prize in 1996 (Oil) Centennial Art Award, WA Society of Arts.