Published December 11, 2008

Gift of art book trumps S'pore acquisitions

By PAULINE NG
IN KUALA LUMPUR

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CHRISTMAS came early this year for Francis Yeoh Seok Ping, and it wasn't in the form of valuable Orchard Road real estate or a multi-billion dollar power plant.

Priceless: Mr Lazzari (right) presents 'La dotta mano' - a special art book depicting pictures of Michelangelo's famous sculptures - to Mr Yeoh, YTL's managing director

Instead, a gift of a limited edition art book of Michelangelo's La dotta mano by the Italian The Fondazione FMR-Marilena Ferrari group left the Malaysian tycoon momentarily tongue-tied before he declared it superior to the YTL Group's recently acquired Singapore assets.

'I am stunned by this gift because I do not know what I would want for a Christmas present other than this. People thought God gave me two Christmas presents already - Orchard Road and PowerSeraya - but this is better,' said Mr Yeoh, YTL's managing director.

The La dotta mano or The Learned Hand is set to become a favourite book - second only to the Gutenberg Bible - the born-again Christian who is not afraid to wear his religion on his sleeve, told the Italians at a presentation ceremony yesterday where he received one of 33 of the special creations which contain a volume of works by the Renaissance master.

Priced at RM500,000 (S$207,500), the cover of the 21 kg book features an exact replica of the Madonna della Scala (Madonna of the Steps) and is carved from the same marble from the Polvaccio quarries used by Michelangelo centuries ago.

Each book took about two years to produce - four months devoted to making the cover alone - and comes with a 500-year guarantee. Mr Yeoh's copy is the only La dotta mano in Malaysia, said Fondazione FMR vice-president Fabio Lazzari who observed that the group had initially heard of Mr Yeoh through the late tenor Luciano Pavarotti who had been a mutual friend. He indicated that the Malaysian had been selected because of his sponsorship of the arts and advocacy of a greener world.

'Forever this joy would be sown in my heart until I meet my wife and Luciano,' Mr Yeoh declared.

Although the global financial crisis had led to thousands of jobs lost and turned the world on its head, he observed: 'We have bought many things at a very good price now. The world is going down but YTL is going up.'

Nonetheless, he said he did not want to be seen as boastful and had rejected interviews in the aftermath of major acquisitions made by the Malaysian conglomerate, which in two short months had invested slightly over S$4 billion in Singapore assets taking over PowerSeraya and a controlling stake in Macquarie Prime Reit.