Singapore Art Week, the annual festival and arguably the pinnacle of Southeast Asia’s visual arts calendar, returns tomorrow, 22nd January, and more than ever, it will shine a light on the resilience and innovation of the region’s artists. In its ninth edition, Singapore Art Week 2021 takes the theme of Art Takes Over, and comprises more than 100 events across both digital and physical locations, making it the largest to date. At the institutional end of the spectrum, established spaces such as the National Gallery Singapore and the gallery cluster of Gillman Barracks will play host to a raft of exhibitions, but so too will art spread beyond the traditional white cube to such unconventional spaces as the Bras Basah Complex and Tanjong Pagar Distripark. Herewith, our list of highlights not to be missed at the Singapore Art Week 2021.
Singapore Art Week 2021 – Digital Events
RESET Talks
Art & Market – Free
Art & Market is playing host to a series of talks, programmed specifically for Singapore Art Work, under the umbrella concept of ‘reset’ – a fitting theme given the significant shifts that have taken place in the art world (and indeed, the world at large) over the past year. These talks will explore key issues and solutions in the local, regional and international art scene, with speakers including Yogya Art Lab's James Page, Comma Space's Wang Ruobing, and Plural Art magazine's Michelle JN Lim.
The Incredible Magic Moving Sticker Exhibition
EYEYAH! – Free
Some 30 well-known and emerging digital artists, including Marty Cooper, Jon Burgerman and Anngee Neo, have come together to design a dizzying array of digital stickers, helping to subvert the everyday to make the world around us a little more light. Viewers can download and use these stickers on your own social media videos.
Open to Interpretation
Asian Art Institutum – Free
Five Singaporean contemporary artists are invited to conceptualise and create three-minute videos exploring the resonance and impact of the online platform. These specially commissioned digital artworks will be presented on Asian Art Institutum’s YouTube channel.
Singapore Art Week 2021 – Hybrid Events
ON/OFF/SCREEN
Deck – Free
Contemplating the possibilities of an expanded cinematic practice in contemporary image-making, ON/OFF/SCREEN features works from artists whose inter-disciplinary practices blur the formal and conceptual boundaries between performance, new media, and the moving image. Featured artists include Ashley Hi, Farizi Noorfauzi, Huijun Lu, and Xie Jie Ng.
Resituating Home(making): Hyper Material Domesticity
Cuturi Gallery – Free
This exhibition centers itself around domesticity, craft and the feminine, working beyond the artifice of the art-versus-craft hierarchy. Four artists – Amirah Raudhah, Dipali Gupta, Fatima Bano, and Masuri Mazlan – will present works looking at the domestic realm as a means of elevated expression. The exhibition features a range of artworks from paintings, sculptures, new media, and installation art, as well as artist-run workshops on various craft-making techniques.
Light to Night
Civic District – Free
Once again, this much-loved activation is set to illuminate Singapore’s civic centre, though this year with a series of complementary physical and digital experiences. From art workshops and livestreamed talks from the comfort of your own home, though to light-based projections and installations to take a walk through during the evening, this is a marquee event at Singapore Art Week.
Inner Like The OutAR
Gillman Barracks – Free
Inner Like The OutAR is an art installation that uses augmented reality to bring you closer to the magic of nature. Immerse yourself in psychotropic digital environments created by Reza Hasni and Siah Tiong Hong amongst set design by Tina Fung (Space Objekt) and sound design by Intriguant. This is the first of such interdisciplinary installations in Singapore to use Web AR, or augmented reality via smartphone browsers on this scale.
Wild Critters
Gillman Barracks – Free
Wild Critters draws on the idea of endangered species. Being a rarity, these creatures are often hidden from sight, hence spotting one leaves most of us in bewilderment. Five artists and collectives – Tell Your Children, Machineast, SuperCyberTown, ClogTwo and UFHO – each create a fictional endangered critter that lives across five different habitats in the district of Gillman Barracks. Make your way down and interact with them through an Instagram Augmented Reality (AR) filter on your mobile devices.
Artist as Collector
Gillman Barracks – Free
Featuring 50 personal artwork collections by 50 local artists, the group exhibition Artist as Collector explores the relationships between the artists and their artistic fellows within the contexts of contemporary art in Singapore. Through archiving the personal and meaningful stories of how an artwork has been acquired by a fellow artist, the exhibition offers a unique view of art about life and highlights the influences between the artists and art communities.
Singapore Art Week 2021 – Physical Events
Maybe we read too much into things
72-13 Mohamed Sultan Road – Free
Maybe we read too much into things brings together six young Singaporean artists whose practices explore the materialities of everyday objects. Across sculpture, installation, video, animation, and painting, these artists’ – including Kevin Fee, Aki Hassan and Genevieve Leong – practices possess a fascination with the familiar, and its potential for transformation.
Escape Velocity V
Singapore Art Museum – Free Admission for Singaporeans and PRs
“What does it mean to listen to Nature in a time of ecological crisis?” asks artist Zai Tang. Escape Velocity V, the artist’s latest surround sound installation, sets his local wildlife recordings in motion towards a darker horizon. This presentation builds upon Tang’s longstanding exploration of sites threatened by urbanisation and hyper-development. Here, in the artificial night of the gallery, voices of the Singaporean wild allude to the rhythms and dynamics of the city, conjuring an otherworldly realm on the verge of extinction.
Singapore Ceramics Now
Gillman Barracks – Free
One of the largest surveys of ceramics art in local art history since the 1990s, this exhibition focuses on contemporary ceramics made by Singapore-based artists, including Ahmad Abu Bakar, Chua Soo Kim, Daisy Toh and Teo Huey Ling, and aims to expand our understanding of the clay medium beyond the realm of pottery. The exhibition includes live demonstrations, participatory performances and installations.
