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Across gallery lines – Fiction of Precision

9 November, 2017 by Chloe

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(Left to right) Hong Sek Chern, Sam Leach, Jeremy Sharma.

Fiction of Precision is a group show in two ways. One, it is an exhibition of works by different artists. Two, it is an exhibition of works held by seventeen different galleries. This remarkable exhibition is the result of the Art Galleries Association Singapore (AGAS), a non-profit organisation founded in 1996. AGAS has been successfully bringing galleries together since then. The society had also spearheaded ArtSingapore, the art fair that preceded Art Stage Singapore.

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(Left to right) Sebastian Mary Tay, Speak Cryptic.

Not all of AGAS members are represented in this show. The participants are: Art Seasons Gallery, Art-2 Gallery, Chan+Hori Contemporary, Element Art Space, FOST Gallery, Gajah Gallery, Intersections Gallery, Mizuma Gallery, Ota Fine Arts, Pearl Lam Galleries, STPI, Sullivan+Strumpf, Sundaram Tagore Gallery, Tokyo Gallery, Wetterling Teo Gallery, Yavuz Gallery and Yeo Workshop. They have brought with them a total of 29 artists, namely: Agan Harahap, Matthew Allen, Laila Azra, Rina Banerjee, Hélène de Chatelier, Golnaz Fathi, Kayleigh Goh, Masanori Handa, David Stanley Hewitt, Hong Sek Chern, Ichi, Indieguerillas, Khai Rahim, Sam Leach, Loke Hong Seng, Kenny Low, Firoz Mahmud, Nhawfal Juma’at, Alvin Ong, PHUNK, Antonio Puri, Qamarul Asyraf, Ren Ri, Taishin Saigawa, Jeremy Sharma, Speak Cryptic, Sinta Tantra, Komkrit Tepthian, and Suzann Victor.

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(Left to right) Suzann Victor, Antonio Puri, Firoz Mahmud, Masanori Handa, Rina Banerjee.

According to the press release, “the exhibition showcases artists who have a profound mastery of their chosen mediums beyond the orthodox.” Each work shown in this exhibition is an example of the artists’ skill and ability to manipulate the material. Komkrit Tepthian completes antique sculptures with lego blocks, Agan Harahap presents photographic proof of scenes that have never existed outside of Photoshop while Ren Ri works with bees to create wax forms of countries around the world. The multiplicity of scales a viewer needs to wield in order to measure each artist’s merits gives a sense of contemporaneity. Many artists today take on the persona of another, be it conservator, designer, beekeeper or something else and dip into the skill set of their chosen alternatives. Superficially speaking, appropriation may seem like a lazy act. However, technical skill and visual impact can easily overcome this perspective and challenge the precise measurement of skill we used to use for art before the contemporary.

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(Left to right) Laila Azra, Agan Harahap, Kenny Low, PHUNK, Komkrit Tepthian.

Unlike a fair, there are no huge name signs built into the partition walls. It is unclear which artist is represented by which gallery from afar unless the visitor is already familiar with the gallery’s portfolio. This is a strength, for galleries have a chance to make a second first impression upon their potential clients: By carefully selecting only a few artwork by two or three artists in their portfolio, they can define themselves differently from what they are commonly thought to be, perhaps reaching out to a new clientele. This is in line with AGAS’s desire to increase the appreciation of art in Singapore.

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(Left to right) Taishin Saigawa, David Hewitt, Ichin.

Beyond the exhibition itself, Fiction of Precision is a quietly significant exhibition because it has successfully brought private galleries together. In today’s society, where we are often only concerned about ourselves and our own businesses, it is a political feat, and a sign of camaraderie among the galleries, for AGAS to have gotten seventeen galleries to come together for a one-month show. Its last joint exhibition happened in 2014. Hopefully, we would not have to wait another three years for the next joint show.

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(Left to right) Alvin Ong, Khairullah Rahim.

Fiction of Precision
1 – 30 November 2017

Millenia Walk
#02-57, 9 Raffles Boulevard
Singapore 039596

Open daily, 11.30am-8.30pm
agas.org.sg
info@agas.org.sg

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What Happened at the Arts Engage Town Hall – Discussions

2 November, 2017 by Chloe

This is a continuation of What Happened at the Arts Engage Town Hall – Formal Presentations.

After the two speakers were done with their presentation, Tarn How asked all participants to form a circle. After much shuffling, the 50 or so attendants sat facing each other. Most remained silent throughout the discussion, which was informally moderated by Tarn How.

In the course of the evening, several cases involving the arts community, recent and ongoing, were raised. In March this year, licensed busker Roy Payamal was arrested mid-performance. He is currently out on bail but it remains unclear even today what was his crime was. In June this year, Function 8, a group of like-minded individuals who are looking to start difficult but important conversations, was arrested for a peaceful act, or “art installation,” on a train on the North East line. The blindfolded actors held on to a copy of 1987 Singapore’s Marxist Conspiracy 30 Years On at eye level as they travelled down the line. In July also this year, 17 people, including arts practitioners like journalist and filmmaker Kirsten Han, were arrested while holding a peaceful candlelit vigil for a man on death row, S Prabagaran, at Changi Prison, a vigil that was initially verbally approved by a member of the police.

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Roy Payamal’s arrest. Image courtesy of Eric Fong.

Opinions toward such incidents are mixed. For Lee Wen, artist, an artist’s actions are understandably sometimes prickly and confusing. No one can be perfectly clear all the time and “it is our stupidity that makes us human.” He calls on the policing body to be more understanding and less dismissive of artistic expressions. Alvin Tan, artistic director of The Necessary Stage, opines that it is about natural justice. To him, the strict word of the law is blind to specific situations, which makes the law ineffective in situations like art, which deliberately wants to inhabit a subjective space. He also shares that while watching 32 Years, he overheard a policewoman describe Seelan’s performance as a “silent protest.” William, NAFA, considers it a matter of dexterity. We should learn to know where the boundaries lie and not to go too close to the edge, to learn to “siam” and accept losing the battle in order to win the war. Woon Tien Wei, Post-Museum, questions this position and asks how we could know where the boundaries lie and how much space we have to speak, and practice art, when it feels like the boundaries are not consistent. A verbally given approval could be retracted in the next moment in the Singapore context. Lee Wen agrees with this but also calls upon the community to continue speaking out and addressing these areas that we, as art practitioners, human beings and citizens of society, still feel are uncertain grounds and a source of fear. This is a reality echoed by situations Zheng Xi has encountered in his practice. Some of his clients tell him that when investigated by the police, the police do not tell them what law has been broken. Rather, they push the onus on his client to be “more forthcoming” with their information. This conundrum places such people under extended investigation, with the restrictions that come with an open investigation, creating an environment of fear and uncertainty. Kai Lam, artist, proposes that the community’s brushes with the law is a matter of regulation and censorship. “Moderation” is being imposed on all forms of expression. Moderation in this situation is viewed negatively, for the way it has been applied does not allow for textured landscape of voices and opinions.

Everyone have different experiences and relationships with the law but the point of the town hall, as the moderator Tarn How says, is to discuss “what can we do.” Citing the arrest of Josef Ng in 1994, Tarn How declared that our problems with the law are not new and that it may seem like our relationship with the law has gotten any better. He described the artistic community as “fed up” but also called on us to continue working to make things better.

Scan of inset photo of Josef Ng from the front cover of The New Paper, Monday, 31 December 1993.

Scan of inset photo of Josef Ng from the front cover of The New Paper, Monday, 31 December 1993.

To this end the attendants also voiced several options. In relation to the formal presentations, Heng Leun asked if legal clinics were something that we needed. Alvin felt that we should educate those policing on the ground to get them to understand performances like Seelan’s as more than just a “silent protest.” Kokila Annamalai, Function 8, pushed the community to ask the administration to grant more permits to perform, so that different types of performances and voices can be seen and begin to be understood by the public. She further acknowledged that needing a permit is itself an issue but that increasing the amount of permits is a step in the right direction. William asked if we could reframe our artistic statements so that they are more understandable to the public. In the case of 32 Years, he wondered if prefacing Seelan’s performance with one of his own in order to get the audience in the right mindset might be a possible way to avoid police persecution. Kai reasoned that if there are 50 or so different voices conducting “radical practice,” the community would be making a stand that “moderation” is problematic, forcing the administration to take the time to understand us rather than dismissing us all. Tarn How proposes that we lay out the “basic positions” within the artistic community so that Arts Engage can speak more clearly with Heng Leun to the parliament and civil society. Eugene Tan, drag queen, questioned how we could speak of a standard response when there is a possibility that being arrested and the processes of the state might be a part of the work. He further points out that many artists take the position of openness for their work, having no singular intent, narrative or meaning but instead asking for a multiplicity of responses from their audience. Kokila adds that while we might think that we are powerless in face of the administration, we are actually really powerful because the administration also need to the arts community to be alive and sustainable, especially if we were to remember that there is an expressed intent for Singapore to be a centre for the arts.

There were also calls for thinking about our problems more broadly to integrate with the concerns civil society. Thirunalan Sasitharan, theatre practice, points out that the issues raised during the town hall are not unique to the arts community. Rather, these are issues that impinge upon human rights and our citizenship and can be felt across civil society. He asks for us to express issues in art and as well as other means, as we are more than just artists or art practitioners. On this topic, Arts Engage pointed at community engagement initiatives, for instance the Manifesto for the Arts and The Artists Call to All to Reject MDA’s Self-Censorship Scheme, which have been successful in garnering support outside of the arts community and in making change happen.

Screenshot from 'Against MDA's Self-Censorship Scheme' video by Arts Engage.

Screenshot from ‘Against MDA’s Self-Censorship Scheme’ video by Arts Engage.

Finally, Kai and Sasha Lim called for the community to be counted in support of Seelan’s freedom of expression, either through a reaction performance or attending to the on-going investigations.

The above serves as an independent record of the proceedings as experienced and understood by a single attendant. Arts Engage will also be releasing a video record of the Town Hall.

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What happened at the Arts Engage Town Hall – Formal presentations

31 October, 2017 by Chloe

The town hall meeting at The Theatre Practice on 54 Waterloo Street was convened by Arts Engage to discuss the relationship of art and law in Singapore. Arts Engage is a group of arts practitioners who have been organizing several public statements for the local artistic community, most significantly against censorship for the arts. They act as a face for arts practitioners to Singapore at large and its administration.

The night started off slowly, possibly because of the rain. A volunteer came around while everyone was settling in and requested for us to write down our names, email addresses and the organisations that we are representing. Once that was done, a video camera began to record the proceedings and Tan Tarn How (Institute of Policy Studies, NUS) sketched out the night: Jennifer Teo (Post-Museum) will give a short introduction to Seelan Palay’s performance, 32 Years: The Interrogation of a Mirror, executed on 1 October 2017 from Hong Lim Park to Parliament House. Remy Choo Zheng Xi (Peter Low & Choo LLC) would then give us a short presentation on Singapore law and how it might relate to the art community before we open the floor to a discussion.

Screenshot from video recording of Seelan Palay's 32 Years: Interrogation of a Mirror by The Online Citizen.

Screenshot from video recording of Seelan Palay’s 32 Years: Interrogation of a Mirror by The Online Citizen.

As Seelan’s work was the cited reason for this town hall, a brief description of 32 Years is required. 32 Years was a one-man performance by Seelan executed on the occasion of his 32nd birthday. He applied for and was granted a license to perform 32 Years in Hong Lim Park. This performance was a tribute to Chia Thye-Poh, whose life was effectively put on hold for 32 years of his life by the Singapore administration.Thye-Poh was incarcerated under the Internal Security Act for 23 years and lived with another nine years of restrictions on his travel, residency, employment and political rights until he was granted his rightful freedom in 1998. Seelan’s performance questions how a man could have been imprisoned for as long as he had lived. 45 minutes before the end of his performance, Seelan was handcuffed in front of Parliament House and had his belongings confiscated by the police.

Before we are allowed to proceed with the discussions of evening, someone calls out for a round of self-introductions. Tarn How begins this by identifying himself as playwright. We learn that there are ‘artists’, ‘playwrights’, ‘theatre practioners’, ‘visual arts’, ‘observers’, ‘students from NAFA’ and others in the crowd.

Video of Seelan Palay's performance, 32 Years.

Video of Seelan Palay’s performance, 32 Years.

Jennifer started her presentation by inviting us to watch a 7-minute edited video clip of Seelan’s performance. This video was produced and published by The Online Citizen. The Online Citizen was also the first to report his arrest during the performance that day. After the video, Jennifer raised several points that she had felt and experienced as someone who was part of the live audience of this performance: The audience had attempted to persuade Seelan to do his performance elsewhere, because of inclement weather, and he refused. (During the town hall, Seelan explained that the three locations were chosen for what they mean for him and should not be changed.) It did not feel like he was performing for an audience, for he did not catch anyone’s eye and his movements seemed directed at the mirror he was holding. In fact, he clearly told the crowd that no one else was part of his performance that day and refused an audience member’s attempt to participate. When he walked out of Hong Lim Park, toward the National Gallery of Singapore, many people in his audience believed that the performance was over and did not follow him further. He was carrying three books: Art as Experience by John Dewey, Foundation by Isaac Asimov and Stories of Lao-Tzu. He also had a white banner with the words Passion Made Probable, a nod toward the newest tagline by Singapore Tourism Board, Passion Made Possible. In the course of his performance, he questioned, “Can the liberated human mind be contained by the state sanctioned space,” and “can the liberated work of art be contained by the state sanctioned space?”

Presentation by Remy Choo Zheng Xi

Presentation by Remy Choo Zheng Xi

Zheng Xi began his presentation with a look at some cases of art and vandalism. He sets the stage with Priyageetha Dia’s golden staircase, which did not result in anyone in handcuffs. Taking on quotes from a report with Channel Newsasia as well as social media, Zheng Xi explains that the kinds of discussion we have about artistic freedom or concept would have no weight in court. This has nothing to do with the general understanding of art but the word of the law. When art actually did clash with the law, in the cases of SKL0, the sticker lady, and Oliver Fricker, the Swiss national who was the first graffiti artist who spray painted an MRT train, the artistic or aesthetic merit of their actions were irrelevant to the disruption to public order.

In court, there is no special provision to art or any practice, a point Zheng Xi drove home with the example of a Falun Gong monk he had represented. This monk placed printed pamphlets and other paper material at fixed places in Singapore’s public landscape and removed them throughout the day. It was ruled that this monk had vandalized public space despite its religious intent and the temporary nature of the pamphlets. Zheng Xi also gave a short exposition on Article 14 of the Singapore Constitution, which both allows and restricts free speech by Singapore Citizens. Through “Calibrated Coercion”, a term coined by the journalist Cherian George, he explained how policing itself, without any formal charges, is a effective tool used by the state to breed uncertainty among the people. He went on to contextualize the art community’s brush with the law with examples in civil society, including Teo Soh Lung, who had her belongings seized for uncertain ‘investigations’ for months. Finally, in the context of the ongoing investigation into Seelan’s performance, Zheng Xi cautioned his audience against stating a position that is for or against Seelan having broken the law.

The above serves as an independent record of the proceedings as experienced and understood by a single attendant. In the next instalment, we will report on some of the opinions and comments that were shared by the attendants of the Arts Engage Town Hall. 

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Artists at Work in the NUS Museum

25 October, 2017 by Chloe

The prep-rooms of NUS Museum look like a mess. There are papers strewn everywhere, random objects placed on the floor and walls. The display is provisional and significantly more cluttered than the beautiful, considered and finished exhibitions in the museum’s other galleries. Just a little out of place in a museum, which we in Singapore know very simply as a place where objects are collected and shown.

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Kate Pocklington’s prep-room.

 Yet, as any researcher should know, museums do more than just display objects in their collection. They are also a resource for research work into these objects or the stories around it. While less visible in Singapore’s museums, our museums also support the exploration and development work that comes with the production of knowledge. The prep-rooms in NUS Museum bring this important but often shadowed work into visibility, allowing us to venture in to find out what some people are working on nowadays.

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Kate Pocklington’s prep-room.

So with that in mind, the prep-rooms begin to reveal the order in their madness. In Kate Pocklington’s prep-room, which on first look seems like a random jumble of rocks, crocodile photos and text, she is sorting, sieving and constructing an image of the crocodile in Singapore’s history, be it newspaper reports, urban legends, loch ness-like photographs or rocks. Once in a while, you may see her in the space considering the far wall, where she has stretched rope in a grid-like system. Coordinates are scribbled in pencil and guide her in plotting out where crocodiles have been seen in Singapore. It is a work in progress. The confusing display is exactly the point, as the prep-room is where people like Kate are continuously working out, spatially or otherwise, how data can be put together meaningfully.

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Fyerool Darma’s prep-room.

So to rephrase the first statement: The prep-rooms of NUS Museum look like the fluid spaces of a researcher’s mind. Some parts make more sense than others and everything does not (yet) come together as a coherent whole. For what the prep-rooms do is give us visitors a look into what goes behind the sleek, final exhibition display and the researchers a chance to think carefully about what works and what does not. To take the example of Kate’s work, which has elements of communal negotiation, there is more than one story, sighting, or truth about the crocodile in Singapore. It takes time, work, and communication to tease out the final answer.

Fyerool Darma's prep-room.

Fyerool Darma’s prep-room.

But of course, not every research project requires a final answer. In the common understanding of work, we would expect a final artwork, essay, exhibition and so on. However, research does not always lead up to that; artists, for instance, may produce art along the way rather than as an end product. In Fyerool Darma’s prep-room, he has appropriated artifacts from the museum’s collection and placing them with contemporary objects. Around the objects are printouts of text documents from museum’s collection. The display invites conversation and debate, which further fuels Fyerool’s research. At the end of his stay, Fyerool may not be producing an exhibition or bringing home any complete works of art (we don’t know yet) but he will have made headway in his practice, which is a liberalising change from product-based projects.

Fyerool Darma's prep-room.

Fyerool Darma’s prep-room the next day.

Another recent prep-room resident is U5. While in the prep-room, this Zurich-based artist collective were negotiating a strand in their work with Future Cities Laboratory. They used the space for Crater Studios, a sub grouping of people from the Future Cities Laboratory that were looking to respond to their work with Indonesia’s volcanoes artistically. U5’s renamed prep-room was used to explore as well as to meet with other collaborators in the project, further drawing from the strengths of the museum’s team, who constantly flit in and out of the space, as well as the scholars and curious public visitors who came by. U5, or Crater Studios, produced artistic propositions, performative experiments and installations. Many have dematerialised by the end of their stay, its material upcycled or re-appropriated for other experiments and work. For the essentialist, U5 has basically done nothing in the prep-room.

U5, The Human Crater, 2017.

U5, The Human Crater, 2017.

However, those who knew them would clearly see that they have grown. NUS Museum curator Sidd Perez, who worked with U5 in the prep-room and curated 17 Volcanoes notes that, “somehow, Crater Studios…became a rehearsal of how they would think of presenting their final work in the 17 Volcanoes exhibition.” The film that Perez referred to, The Human Crater, is not a direct product of their time in the prep-room. However, the experience inflected upon their process and perspective, which were refined by the expectation-light space of the prep-rooms. It is these forms of long-term impact that NUS Museum’s prep-rooms seek to address.

Exhibition view of 17 Volcanoes, Annex Gallery, NUS Museum.

Exhibition view of 17 Volcanoes, NX1 Gallery, NUS Museum.

How do you conduct research in art? What is research for art? In our fast-paced society, where new artwork pops up at every turn and it seems like every artist is at every show, artistic practice may start to seem like factory production, constantly spitting out more and more and more works of art. However, as places like the prep-room indicate, our artists do more, and need more, than just produce works of art. They want to, and should, spend time thinking about their work, how their work is produced and why they produce these kinds of work (or any work at all). For being an artist is more than just producing artwork but about artistic practice, a idea that each individual artist needs to define for his or her own. Places like the NUS Museum provide artists sorely needed space and time to do just that, and since art lovers are a kind of artist themselves, we should also spend some time in the prep-room ourselves, as resident-visitors.

 NUS Museum
50 Kent Ridge Crescent
Singapore 119279
6516 8817
museum@nus.edu.sg

Tuesdays to Saturdays, 10am-6pm
museum.nus.edu.sg

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Must see film: Exposé on the art world

23 October, 2017 by Chloe

It’s Singapore Design Film Festival 2017, the first film festival in Asia dedicated solely on design. While the all films chosen are worth catching for its various merits, art lovers should get particularly excited by Blurred Lines: Inside the Art World. This film, directed by Barry Avrich that demystifies the structures of the Euro-american art market through revealing the perspectives of gallerists like Stephen Friedman of Stephen Friedman Gallery (London), artists like Damien Hirst (London) and Julian Schnabel (New York), art fairs like Art Basel (Switzerland) and auctioneers at Christies. See the trailer below:

It would be wrong to apply what Avrich shows to the Singapore and Southeast Asian scene but we all love a bit of gossip and scandal, and this is an exposé that lies close to the reality of a workings of the art market.

This 86-min film will be showing at Capitol Theatre, the venue partner for the festival, on 29 October, 1.30pm. You can purchase tickets for this film as well as the other films in the festival here.

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Double bill at Chan+Hori Contemporary: Danielle Tay+Shahrul Jamili Miskon

19 October, 2017 by Chloe

Group shot

Chan + Hori team with Danielle Tay and Shahrul Jamili Miskon.

Since its inauguration in March 2017 at Gillman Barracks, Chan + Hori Contemporary, led by Angie Chan and Khairuddin Hori, has been consistently promoting their exhibitions as double solo exhibitions. With the exception of Not a Summer Hang, the curatorial programming, on paper, has taken the gallery space as a divisible into two distinct exhibition spaces. Over time, however, the artworks have begun to intrude into each other’s spaces, working with each other to create interesting conversations. The current shows feature Danielle Tay and Shahrul Jamili Miskon, whose visually distinct practices belie their shared concerns.

Danielle Tay

Danielle Tay, Unconventional Choices, 2017.

Danielle Tay’s dreamscapes express her realistic utopia. Beginning from a sketch in Chinese ink, Tay dreams about dissonant lived spaces that delight, rather than disturb. Unconventional Choices is a real space in Singapore. On a potted plant, which is placed at a thoroughfare in a residential space, a bird makes its nest. This plant is only about as tall as a human being and is constantly being disturbed by throngs of people who activate the space every day. Yet the bird continues to make its nest here, in the middle of a hive of human activity, disregarding the very real human threat of destruction. And in unspoken agreement, the residents have been leaving the bird to be, leaving her to bring up her family in peace each season. The contradiction between what we expect to happen and what is really happening as well as the coincidence of the bird’s choice to find her nest in an unconventional space amuses, delights and inspires. It is an irrationality that does not have a scientific explanation, a thematic that can be traced through her other works in this show.

Shahril Jamili Miskon, Metalanguage XVIII, 2017.

Shahril Jamili Miskon, Metalanguage XVIII, 2017.

Shahrul’s works in this show, unilaterally from his Metalanguage series, are challenge our spatial imagination. Shahrul describes them as partial forms that can multiply infinitely off his canvas. In Metalanguage XVIII, a circle of regular diameter is layered and tiled over each other to the edge of the aluminium, pointing at never-ending repetition. A line is etched between the centres of the layered circles, which reveal its length as the radius. This absolute length is found between every two centres, a satisfying regularity. Somewhere in the middle of his canvas, Shahrul has also etched out a square, which is evenly divided into three rectangles lengthwise and further subdivided into right-angled triangles. On the first rectangle, equilateral triangles are added on each side. Before this becomes a laundry list of mathematical terms that lead to nowhere, the laser cut pieces from the aluminium should be seen as the key to this geometric study. Alternatively removed and raised up in an origami-like fashion, the square reveals itself to be the square surface of a twisted prism that is faced by parts of the circular forms. The way shapes are coincidentally, or naturally, found within each other plays on the incidence of mathematical precision and reality.

Room shot

Installation view for UNCERTAIN DISCOVERIES & METALANGUAGE.

While both artists are known to venture into other media, a consistent material thematic is established in these shows. Tay has produced work in wood and Shahrul has work in ceramic, for instance. Neither makes an appearance here. While that might reflect where each artist is in their practice at the moment, it is more productive to think about the curatorial choices made by Khairuddin and to question how it is that the works speak to each other. And indeed, as initially raised, there is a concerted effect to bring the works together and create a singular experience. It is difficult to only look at Shahrul or Tay while in the space. That is not to erase their difference, of which there are many. Instead, there is just about enough space to think about the incidences at which they meet.

12thOct2017_Thu_CHC-1

Installation view of works by Danielle Tay.

Just to name a couple: In the papercut technique, precision is paramount. Every hesitation marks the edge permanently, corrupting the later montage. In the same way, the way acid bites aluminium is permanent and irrecoverable. Clarity, dexterity and pre-planning are factors that underpin both Tay’s painted collages and Shahrul’s geometric collages. For the works in these shows, both artists are also working in a scale that is governed by the human body. Whether it was or was not a conscious decision, a single person can easily handle the works by both artists. For Tay, it has to do with the size of commercially available paper as well as her haptic movements around the table where she does her collage. For Shahrul, he is restricted by the standard available size of aluminium, which is 4 feet (almost 122cm) across. These underlying similarities, which layer meaningfully on the curatorial programme’s look on the spiritual becoming and unseen forces of the world, do not detract from the artists’ language but rather tie them together in a tantalising way.

Detail of 'Metalanguage XVII'.

Detail of ‘Metalanguage XVIII’.

UNCERTAIN DISCOVERIES & METALANGUAGE
Danielle Tay and Shahrul Jamili Miskon
12 October – 5 November

Chan + Hori Contemporary
6 Lock Road #02-09
Gillman Barracks
Singapore 108934
+65 6338 1962
info@chanhori.com

Tuesdays to Sundays, 11am – 7pm
Closed on Mondays and public holidays

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