Singapore Biennale 2006
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Thursday, May 13, 2004
p-10's Art Networking Potluck no.6 on 17 May (Mon)
Details on the Session
Date: 17 May 2004 (Mon)
Time: 7.30pm
Venue: p-10
Free entry, BYO drinks and food.
Limited capacity, please RSVP.
Gooi Tah Choe's talk will focus on Tan Dun's 'Ghost Opera', which is part of his research on hybrid, multiculturalism and compositional strategies. Tan Dun is a composer who thinks both about visual aesthetics and the musical experience. In his compositions, concepts from shamanism are transformed and staged as a multicultural platform of musical quotations and collage. Excerpts from 'Ghost Opera', performed by Kronos Quartet, will be shown.
Chuan's talk entitled 'Subjects, Objects, and Phrase-formation in Musical Composition'will begin with a fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson 'The Emperor's New Clothes', an illustrated way of describing and interpreting the key terms and issues in the talk: subject, subjection, subject-formation, object, objectification, and object-relation. We shall then examine the consequences of a severer theoretical position offered in Theodor Adorno's critique on 'The Culture Industry', with an emphasis 'On The Fetish Character in Music and the Regression of Listening'. And to balance the cautionary tale from Adorno, we shall pay a visit to Continental philosophy through Deleuze and Derrida, occasionally dropping by Roland Barthes. And in conclusion to the talk, Chuan will introduce a theory of 'phrase-formation', to re-examine what 'listeners' as 'subjects' mean, and to rethink the notions of 'unit' and 'unity' of 'material' and 'structure' in musical composition. Chuan will be playing some of his pieces to lessen the doldrums of his talk.
*The talk will be broadcasted live online. You will need to install Yahoo Messenger in order to tune in. When you log onto the Yahoo Messenger network, please contact: acidiq.
About the Speakers
Gooi Tah Choe graduated from University of British Columbia in 1997 and had been a doctorate music research scholar and teaching assistant in VPA, NIE, from 1997-2001. His research area is on Tan Dun's music, with main focus on composition strategies and identity. Having taught music in both Raffles Junior College (MEP) and Woodgrove Secondary School, he has been arranging and composing for participating choirs in SYF competition as well as other musical groups.
Chuan (Li-Chuan Chong) is a composer and sonic artist who is currently a research student, PhD in Composition, at Goldsmiths College. Chuan collaborates with artists of various disciplines, involving sound as a key element in concept and realisation. He has worked on numerous projects with practitioners in theatre, performance and visual arts, writing music and sound design for film and video, and hopes to continually expand his horizon in the field of sound organisation. For more info, see http://listen.to/chuan.
Art Networking Potluck no.7
Another Tan and Cheong Arttalk
Tan Wee Lit and Cheong Kah Kit talk about their art practice and latest exhibition.
Details on the Session
Date: 19 May 2004 (Wed)
Time: 7.30pm
Venue: p-10
Free entry, BYO drinks and food.
Limited capacity, please RSVP.
*The talk will be broadcasted live online. You will need to install Yahoo Messenger in order to tune in. When you log onto the Yahoo Messenger network, please contact: acidiq.
About the Speakers
Cheong Kah Kit (b. 1976) is one of 4 artists selected as part of the Singapore contingent in the 11th Asian Art Biennale 2004 in Bangladesh, a bi-annual exhibition featuring the cream of artists from Asia, Middle East and the Asia Pacific. He has also participated and co-organized exhibitions like WhistleBristle (2004) at Studio 106 and The Idiots Gaze Again (2003) at SG Private Banking Gallery, Alliance Francaise de Singapour, of which he was awarded the National Arts Council Project Grant for the former. Cheong is also actively involved in art education, conducting various art classes and workshops in schools and institutes of various levels here.
Having graduated with High Distinction from his Bachelors of Arts (Fine Art) at RMIT-LASALLE, Tan Wee Lit (b. 1978) has continued to exhibit extensively locally and in the region. He has recently represented Singapore in Identities vs Globalisation - a travelling exhibition featuring artists from all 10 ASEAN countries organized by the Heinrich-Boll Foundation in Chiangmai, which will be subsequently brought over to Bangkok and Berlin. He was also one of a contingent of local artists invited by Taksu Gallery to Kuala Lumpur for Bilateral Bonds in the Gallerys showcase of contemporary Singaporean artists. Tan has also been persistently active in showcasing his works in Singapore as well. Being awarded the Georgette Chen Arts Scholarship and the NAC Arts Bursary (Local) by the National Arts Council is evident of the support he has won in return.
Another Tan and Cheong Artshow is being held at The Substation until 22 May 2004.
p-10 is located at 10 Perumal Road S218777.
Nearest MRT station is Farrer Park. Exit at Exit G (Serangoon Road), Perumal Road is the first left street. We are in the 3-storey building down the street.
For more info, please see www.p-10.org or contact tel: +65 6294-0041
Month of Photography 2004
Popular Pleasures Through Photography
The Month of Photography is a collaborative effort between the French Embassy and the National Arts Council to showcase contemporary photography. For 2004, MOP will examine the role of photography in popular culture through three curated exhibitions. Pop shots brings together 10 Singapore artists who use photography as a critical tool to establish and produce new meanings, identities and narratives in their works dealing with popular culture. An exhibition entitled Pop Culture! featuring 22 works from the National Foundation of Contemporary Art will be shown. Beautiful Dragon, an exhibition featuring celebrated French artists/photographers, Pierre and Gilles, will be held for the first time in Southeast Asia. Beautiful Dragon, organised jointly by the French Embassy and the Singapore Art Museum, will feature pop portraits of Asian faces.
4-20 June
Pop Culture!
The Arts House at Old Parliament
1 Old Parliament Lane
10 am - 10 pm daily
Tel: 63326900
Pop shots
The Substation Gallery
45 Armenian Street
11 am - 9 pm daily,
Closed on public holidays
Tel: 6337 7535
SG Private Banking Gallery,
Alliance Francaise de Singapour
1 Sarkies Road
11 am - 7 pm,
Closed on Sundays and public holidays
Tel: 6737 8422
17 June - 18 July
Beautiful Dragon
Singapore Art Museum
71 Bras Basah Road
Mon to Sun
10 am - 7 pm,
Fri extended hours to 9 pm
Tel: 6332 3222
"In Print" - The Best of British Contemporary Printmaking
The Singapore Tyler Print Institute and The British Council, with the support of the National Arts Council, jointly present the internationally acclaimed travelling exhibition, "In Print", featuring 123 contemporary prints by 24 prominent British artists, including Turner Prize winners Anish Kapoor, Damien Hirst, Rachel Whiteread and Chris Ofili as well as nominees such as Jake and Dinos Chapman, Anya Gallacio and Gary Hume in addition many others from the YBA group(named after a series of exhibitions of Young British Artists held at the Saatchi Gallery in London from 1991); and other artists such as Patrick Heron and Terry Frost will also be represented.
The prints were created through collaborations between leading London-based print publisher, Paragon Press, and artists not usually engaged in the graphic arts. The influence of different art practices provided fertile grounds for experimentation and technical development, resulting in an unprecedented representation of contemporary British art in various print media ranging from screenprints and etchings to lithographs and woodcuts.
reformasi : contemporary Indonesian artists post 1998
Indonesia, Southeast Asia's largest and most populous country, has experienced radical change at every level of society since the fall of President Suharto in the spring of 1998. reformasi, the largest and most comprehensive survey of Indonesian contemporary art yet shown in Singapore, seeks to give contemporary Indonesian practitioners a voice. Their work, sometimes radically innovative in concept or form, expresses their concerns and reactions to life as it unfolds in this unsettling world of challenge and promise. The exhibition will mark the 5th Anniversary of Sculpture Square's inauguration and is the Square's most important exhibition of 2004. Some of the artists featured include Agus Suwage, Apotik Komik, Arahmaini, Bunga Jeruk, Eko Nugroho, FX Harsono, Hedi Hariyanto, Heri Dono, Mella Jaarsma, Nindityo Adipurnomo and Tin Tin Wulia.
Reconstruction of a City - A Visions & Illusions Exhibition
Join the revolution from 1 - 18 June 2004! Singapore's new generation of creative guerillas are transforming St James Power Station into a multi-media art extravaganza!
Artists, designers, architects, photographers and poets from all over the world are joining forces to transform the 1920s colonial heritage site into a wonderland of fantastical surprise for all your six senses...
From street art to fine art, you will be surprised at what you'll find in unexpected nooks and crannies. Find treasures in the creative wares up for sale. Or help build an urban garden by bringing along your own potted plant. Whether as participant or observer, your perception of the Singapore artscape will be altered at Reconstruction of a City!
Reconstruction of a City is a site-specific art exhibition which explores how Singaporean artists and writers perceive their personal life experiences in relation to Singapore as a city.
Cities are about building relationships between various people who participate in activities of common interest in a shared public space. Yet even as the artists and writers are looking for marks of identity that determine what is Singapore or Singaporean, they also realize they share a common human and urban condition with inhabitants of other cities.
Thus at St James Power Station, they create a “city” which reflects their visions and illusions – be it recognizable as distinctively Singaporean or with characteristics common with other cities in the world.
Reconstruction of a City is the exhibition component of Visions & Illusions, an ongoing multi-disciplinary project undertaken by over 50 leading young visual artists and writers to explore site-specific installation work
The Exhibition:
The exhibition involves six unique and highly innovative installation works incorporating new media, video, photography and architectural installations.
i) TGV
Artists: the2ndrule
Curator: Michelle Lim
TGV is an interactive digital media work focused on the idea of movement. It taps on the pulse of our urbanscape through an installation combining sound-reactive video and video-reactive sound. Movement and sound produced by the audience and performers generates constantly changing projections on a large screen, while movement triggers off audio loops from installed speakers. A true collaboration between artist and audience, TGV combines art and technology in a stimulating performance that reflects the organic nature of human activity in an urban space.
ii) Inhabitations: Entrapment of a Culture
Artists: sciSKEW Collaborative
Curator: Michelle Lim
In this architectural installation, visitors are taken through a looped journey of radical experimentation and discovery through St James Power Station. Making their way through conceptual mind traps, visitors are compelled to challenge their own consumption of art against the context of broader urban culture processes. Real time documentation of visitors and their interactions with the five mobile installations will be looped to the virtual spaces of the project website. sciSKEW draws from issues of construction and reconstruction that weave through three metropolises: New York after 9/11, Shanghai before Expo 2010 and Singapore as a comprehensive hub. With a combination of physical and online manifestations, the project will confront Singaporeans with the very real implications of a global city under reconstruction.
iii) A Room for Hurt and Happiness
Artists: Gary Lim and Terence Chan
Curators: Low Kee Hong and Michelle Lim
How does one find balance in modern-day relationships where anything goes and nothing lasts? Eroticized spaces are created in this evocative architectural installation, which explores the inherent instabilities in human relationships and puts to test the fragile ties that bind people together.
iv) The Lost Garden
Artists: Henderson Secondary School Aesthetics Club, Visions & Illusions collaborators and members of the public
Curators: Heng Swee Kiang and Michelle Lim
The toughest obstacles are the limits we draw for ourselves. Young artists and gardeners from a local school begin by turning the concrete floor into a giant canvas, weaving chalk patterns into an imaginative display. The youths, together with the Visions & Illusion project collaborators, plant the seeds for a unique urban garden by placing potted plants in the vast gallery. The idea being that the more plants there are, the more lines will be covered. Members of the public are invited to participate in this public art activity by bringing their own potted plant or by helping to water the plants. Only with the support of our community can a flourishing garden appear at the end of the process, thus creating a dynamic living artwork about overcoming the invisible boundaries in our lives.
v) Art in all Nooks ‘n’ Crannies: Rethinking Space
Artists: Various artists
Curators: Putri Trisulo and Tan Shir Ee
Art is everywhere. Artists and creators from various disciplines including the graphic arts, fashion and music have installed their works in unexpected places all over the site, transforming the former power station into a true home for art. In a site once devoted to consuming natural resources in order to produce energy for the city’s development, the artists share fresh perspectives on recycling and conservation issues.
vi) Super Art-Mart
Artists: Various artists & collaborators
Curator: Josef Ng, Michelle Lim and Putri Trisulo
Collaborators: Zouk and Asia Fashion Week
In the dead of the night, the lighted convenience store is the only beacon of life in the sprawling metropolis. Located in the depths of an anonymous Asian city, a reconstructed convenience store designed by artist-architects becomes the stage for an urban theatre performance that will challenge our definition of art. Excavating memories of former World Trade Centre trade fairs, Super Art-Mart re-contextualises and distills the scene into the context for the opening club party by Zouk. Unique and aesthetically original "products" by invited architects, musicians, artists and fashion designers will be displayed for sale at vintage prices. A cultural project that challenges the boundaries between pure art and commercial incentive, Super Art-Mart is also an interactive performance art show where all visitors will have something to bring home. And they will walk out and say, well, is this ART?
The Team - Curators, Artists, Writers, and Project Managers:
Reconstruction of a City is a true Singapore effort. The team consists of individuals who are all Singaporean. Although they may be residing in other parts of the world from New York, Bangkok, Nice, Shanghai to Xi’an, they share a common cause – to articulate their vision for the arts in Singapore to an international audience.
Curators:
A team of independent curators has conceptualized a series of curatorial projects to frame the debate of key issues of art-making and writing in Singapore against a larger international context. Curators include Michelle Lim, who is also a critical writer and artist, Josef Ng, a Bangkok-based arts writer and art consultant, and Low Kee Hong, a sociologist and Associate Artistic Director of TheatreWorks (Singapore).
Artists:
The artists have been chosen for their varied interests and vastly different modes of expression. They each possess a strong proven track record for committed initiatives in art-making and experimental innovations in terms of concept and technique. Artists include New York-based architect-artist Eunice Seng, graphic designer-cum-artist Gary Lim, and the2ndrule team consisting of Shannon Low, Koh Beng Liang, Russell Chan and Jason Tong.
Writers:
Various critical writers, including photographers, will participate in a large-scale documentation which will be next phase of the Visions & Illusions project, following the exhibition. It will serve to capture a “snapshot” of these salient issues that have surfaced in art-making and critical writing for this generation of 20-35 year olds at this point in time. Participants include award-winning poet, playwright and writer Alfian bin Sa’at, poet-writer Toh Hsien Min, and New York-based photographer John Clang.
Project Managers:
For the first time, issues in the larger context of the Singapore creative industry such as sponsorship, arts branding, and project management will be explored by a team of branding, advertising, finance, engineering, IT and architecture professionals. They will build a new support infrastructure which will enable independent art activities to flourish with the institutional structure of government and private corporations.
The scale of this cross-disciplinary collaboration is unprecedented in Singapore’s contemporary art history. This new generation of creative guerrillas will take Singapore art scene to the next plane and prove that with enough faith, visions can become reality and not mere illusions – even in a pragmatic place like Singapore!
Fact Sheet
Reconstruction of a City
A Visions & Illusions Exhibition
An In-Conjunction Visual Arts Event of the Singapore Arts Festival 2004
Opening Dates
Tuesday 1 – Friday 18 June 2004
11am - 6pm daily
Admission
Free, open to all members of the public
Tel Nos
9009 0070 & 9621 8216
Address and Directions
St James Power Station
211 Keppel Road Singapore 099421
(Beside the entrance to the Sentosa Causeway Bridge)
Nearest MRT: Harbourfront MRT (Northeast Line)
Car Park: Private car park in front of building (limited parking) or at Harbourfront Centre
Website
www.visionillusion.com
Organizers
Reconstruction of a City, the first Visions & Illusions exhibition, is a collaborative effort by several established curators, artists, writers and project managers. All members are providing pro-bono support for this cause.
Main Sponsor:
Mapletree
Other sponsors:
Art Vital BrandCulture doubledutch
In Conjunction With The Singapore Arts Festival
Content Contributor: Art Vital
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