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Gallery Talk "A matter of ownership:
dialogues on art and cultural space of Hong Kong and
Singapore, Part 2'
Guest Speaker:
Weng Choy Lee, Artistic Co-director, The Substation in
Singapore
Moderator: Ms Linda
Lai, Associate Professor, School of Creative Media, City
University of Hong Kong,
(with participation of
other Hong Kong artists and speakers from the part I of this
project in Singapore, namely, Oscar Ho, Jaspar Lau, Lee Kit,
Leung Chi Wo, Tim Li, Ellen Pau, Map Office/ Gutierrez +
Portefaix, Sara Chi-Hang Wong, Reine Kit-Shun Wong and more)
Date : 4.
June.05 (Sat), 2:30-4:30pm,
Venue : Para/Site
Art Space , G/F, 4 Po Yan Street, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong
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The works
Utama – Every Name in
History is I
a film by Ho Tzu Nyen
The very name “Singapura” was a paradox. For no lion had
ever set foot in this Lion City.
— CM Turnbull, A History of Singapore 1819 – 1988
In the official accounts of its history, Singapore was founded
in 1819 by Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, as part of the British
colonial empire. However, little is known about the other,
pre-colonial founder of Singapore, who is believed to have
founded the Asian city sometime between the 13th and 14th
century. Commonly referred to as Sang Nila Utama,
regarded as the “first” king of the Malays and said to be
heir to a glorious lineage of great kings and immortals, he was
said to have given Singapore its name after encountering a lion
along its shores. In the indigenous Malay tongue, “Singa”
means lion, while “pore” is derived from the word “pura”,
or city.
However, this event has often been questioned because lions are
not a species indigenous to this area. For many historians, Utama’s
existence is itself a major issue of doubt — he was known
under a variety of names and pseudonyms, and attributed with a
multiplicity of identities and stories, many of which are
contradictory in nature. In today’s Singaporean society, the
figure of Utama has been gradually erased from public
consciousness.
This film is an attempt to summon forth the specter of Utama
— but he does not return alone. Instead he comes return with
an unruly host of characters, fictional, mystical and
historical. Ultimately this is a film about the intertwining of
myth and history, the impossibility of ontology, the instability
of all beginnings.
Utama was first presented at The Substation in 2003.
I
Remember… (Singapore)
conceived by Amanda Heng
A collaborative public event
that addresses issues in public space, I Remember…
explores the faculty of memory — how we remember, as
individuals and as a collective; the vibrancy of remembrance VS
sanitized, mediated stories of war; selective recall; personal
and public ways of commemorating; different ways of remembering;
and how memories relate to everyday experiences.
Artist Amanda Heng will present images and stories of those
recalling the days of the Japanese occupation in World War II in
video recordings to examine and investigate the issues of memory
and the construction of history and their significance for
individuals and society.
I Remember ... was first presented at The Necessary
Stage's M1 Singapore Fringe Festival. Amanda Heng is in the
progress of developing the work for another presentation at The
Substation during the 2005 Septfest.
Amanda
Heng, I Remember ...,
video
still of live performance, 26 February 2005.
Presented
as part of The Necessary Stage's Fringe Festival.
The
artists
Ho
Tzu Nyen
graduated
from Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne University in
2001, where he obtained a Bachelor of Creative Arts. His first
exhibited artwork was a fake pack of cigarettes made from
the paraphernalia (notices, posters, etc.) generated to
publicise French philosopher Jacques Derrida’s tour of
Australia. Since then, Ho Tzu Nyen’s art practice has been
marked by a diversity in his choice of media. Upon returning to
Singapore, Tzu Nyen has been painting regularly, and his works
have won him awards, including the Nokia Arts Awards 2001, and
the prize for the Abstract Category of the UOB Painting of the
Year 2001. Tzu Nyen also has an interest in uncovering the
possibilities of imaging devices: in The Cave (Nokia
Singapore Art 2001), he constructed a room-sized space saturated
with surveillance cameras and monitors, while his more recent A
Possible Line of Flight (Cinepolitans, 2003) consisted of
images captured from cameras flung off from a 25-storey-high
building. Another medium that has fascinated Tzu Nyen is
photography. In Anyone (2002), he requested that his
subjects “become someone else” by play-acting, or adopt a
narrative pose “far from the truth”. In an upcoming work,
the Self-Portrait Project (Sculpture Square Annual Show
2003), Tzu Nyen will approach 36 passers-by a day, seven days a
week, in several different locations to do portraits of himself.
But Tzu Nyen’s oldest and greatest passionis film.
Amanda
Heng
(Liang Ngim) is a
full-time arts practitioner. She adopts an interdisciplinary
approach to her arts practice. Her works deal with the clashing
of eastern and western values, traditions and gender roles in
the context of a multicultural and fast-changing society of
Singapore. Recently, her work focuses on the issues of
communication and human relationships in urban environments, and
she often works in collaboration with people from both art and
non-art fields and of different cultural backgrounds. Amanda was
involved in founding the Artists’ Village, the first
artists-run space in Singapore in 1988. She is also actively
involved in conceptualising, curating, organising and
participating in exhibitions and public forums, conducting
workshops and lecturing in contemporary art. She has a Bachelors
of Art from Curtin University, and has exhibited widely in
Singapore and internationally, including the Asia-Pacific
Triennial, the Havana Biennale and the Fukuoka Triennial.
_______________________________
Co-presented by Para/site Art
Space and The Substation, and is funded by the 'Bilateral
Cultural Exchange Project'* and the National Arts Council,
Singapore.
* The
"Bilateral Cultural Exchange Project" is co-presented
by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department and the Hong
Kong Arts Development Council.
For more information, please
contact
Caroline Hu: Tel: (+852)
25174620,
caroline@para-site.org.hk
Acknowledgement:
Art & Culture Outreach, all friends, helpers and
volunteers of Para/Site Art Space
Para/Site Art Space is a registered charity art
organisation, financially supported by the Hong Kong Arts
Development Council and private donations. Please
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