https://badimitation.com Bad Imitation Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:29:58 +0000 https://badimitation.com en https://badimitation.com/Menu Tue, 21 Dec 2021 10:08:32 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Menu ︎ Homepage About Curators’ Notes Artists 1 Ashley Hi 2 Catherine Hu 3 Daniel Chong 4 Khairullah Rahim x Nghia Phung 5 Michael Lee 6 Moses Tan 7 Pat TohEssays A Faezah Zulkifli B Justin Zhuang C Nabilah Said Instagram Facebook Event Event Guide https://badimitation.com/Bad-Imitation Thu, 09 Dec 2021 09:00:27 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Bad-Imitation Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/About Wed, 22 Dec 2021 07:50:34 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/About Words byBerny Tan&amp; Daniel Chong A bad imitation is clumsy; it fumbles and flails. Its failures in mimesis expose a human process of (re)production, in all its fallibilities and eccentricities. A gap thus opens between the copy and the original, made blatantly obvious by the copy’s perceived inferiority. By failing, however, a bad imitation reveals more of its original than the original ever could. It steals from its source material, yet gives back by emphasising its own genesis. Oscillating within this strange cyclical loop, the copy can become more compelling than what it seeks to imitate.Bad Imitation deliberately occupies this blurry threshold between copy and original. Moving beyond discourses of authenticity and faithfulness, it instead frames this threshold as a generative space of difference. Across diverse art practices, this exhibition presents imitations that are imprecise, flawed, and intentionally adjacent to the original. Be it objects, gestures, or images, these attempts at (re)production keep the original alive, yet firmly in their shadow.This exhibition is part of Singapore Art Week 2022, held from 14 to 23 January 2022. https://badimitation.com/Curators-Notes Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:29:58 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Curators-Notes FROM ‘ABSURD’ TO ‘BAD’ Exactly a year ago, I showed a series of four works collectively titled Absurd Intimacies. One of these works consisted of hundreds of biscuits made out of hand-painted air dry clay, with a single ‘bite’ in each one. The other three were variations on milk spills created using resin, which had seemingly ‘pooled’ on carpets and various items of clothing. In these spills ‘floated’ pop-coloured cereal, also made out of air dry clay. Absurd Intimacies was shown in a group exhibition called Maybe we read too much into things, which was curated by Bad Imitation’s co-curator Berny Tan. It is apt, then, that this body of work became the conceptual and material breeding ground for the exhibition we are curating together. Absurd Intimacies appropriated familiar domestic scenes, focusing on objects that held human traces, then threw them into a space of unfamiliarity. For the exhibition, Berny wrote the following description of the series: This ongoing series explores the fallacy of attempting to replicate past intimacies in the pursuit of future ones. Through the use of the domestic and unassuming, Chong recreates the traces that mark a person’s presence—a bite, a spill, clothes left crumpled on the floor—which then become vessels of lost intimacies in the absence of the human body. His chosen objects are repeated, preserved, and manufactured into strange scenes that convey an uncanny mix of desire, anxiety, and hope. ‘Replicate’, ‘recreate’, ‘repeated’—I had already been exploring imitative gestures in these works, and in the works that came before them. Here too was the ‘uncanny’, a shift from reality that was just slight enough to be unsettling, which would later become the cornerstone of this concept of the ‘bad imitation’. <img width="5664" height="3776" width_o="5664" height_o="3776" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/1d1ecadeaecf22611cd304265307717ff321aeda049e3c4b3d9b53bff50d481c/01a_Daniel-Chong_Absurd-Intimacies.JPG" data-mid="129603807" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/1d1ecadeaecf22611cd304265307717ff321aeda049e3c4b3d9b53bff50d481c/01a_Daniel-Chong_Absurd-Intimacies.JPG" /> <img width="5760" height="3840" width_o="5760" height_o="3840" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d43eca6c2b4fcde8725df8e4de71589b9023b9259b6433cdbb12817ec402bb96/01b_Daniel-Chong_Absurd-Intimacies.JPG" data-mid="129603808" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d43eca6c2b4fcde8725df8e4de71589b9023b9259b6433cdbb12817ec402bb96/01b_Daniel-Chong_Absurd-Intimacies.JPG" /> Daniel Chong, Absurd Intimacies, 2020–21. Installation views, Maybe we read too much into things, curated by Berny Tan at 72-13, 2021. Courtesy of the artist and curator. Photo by Marvin Tang. Even so, I wouldn’t say that Absurd Intimacies was about imitation, and that I was thinking about it in those terms. Yet in conversations I have had about this series, some common references emerged, linking my works to ‘copies’. One in particular was Walter Benjamin’s idea of the ‘aura’. In his 1936 essay The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, Benjamin discussed how a reproduction always fails to represent an artwork’s aura, defined as its “presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be”. This concept was mentioned to me time and time again, though it never felt like the right fit for Absurd Intimacies, which was neither about the aura nor the authenticity of the original objects. The works I created were, in fact, ‘bad’ replicas: the biscuits were painted the wrong colours, even too bright to be natural; the cereal pieces were oddly shaped and garishly coloured, more neon than pastel. Strangely, however, these ‘errors’ didn’t seem to matter. What I was trying to recreate was not the object, but its associated feelings, and I was able to do so even without being entirely faithful to the original. In spite of the inaccuracies, many viewers claimed to feel a sense of childhood nostalgia upon encountering my works; it was almost as if everyone possessed memories that were, in themselves, bad imitations of the real objects. Somehow, my works seemed to invoke something like Benjamin’s ‘aura’ of the original, although I feel uncomfortable with this framing even now. Thoughts such as these left me in a conceptual limbo, unable to fully grasp the affect I was producing with my work. This undefinable thing was equal parts compelling and frustrating, and it began to infiltrate my conversations with other artists throughout the rest of 2021. This was when I began to realise I was not alone in contending with this affect. Going by other names and explanations, it was something that a number of my peers were trying to manifest in their work, without entirely understanding it themselves. <img width="4552" height="2561" width_o="4552" height_o="2561" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/471c7cdcdabfe8936a547c51765fe97c13d94e4c4c575f23c7e2c222d5bcf57d/02_Catherine-Hu.jpg" data-mid="129603837" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/471c7cdcdabfe8936a547c51765fe97c13d94e4c4c575f23c7e2c222d5bcf57d/02_Catherine-Hu.jpg" /> Catherine Hu, study for Twice as Far Away (Blue Tile Table). Courtesy of the artist. Bad Imitation grew out of these months of conversations and brooding. I am thinking of the exhibition format as a chance to cast a wider net; to think through the act of and impulse to imitate across multiple works and practices. Putting together this show feels more akin to mapping the space under the folds of blankets or comparing the volumes of shadows. I am trying to find the answers to questions I never knew I needed to ask. JUMPING INTO THE GAP Many parts of Bad Imitation were challenging, but inviting Berny to co-curate was not one of them. One casual text later and we were already trying to deconstruct my ideas. At this time—before the project was even titled Bad Imitation—we ourselves had trouble understanding what exactly it was that we were attempting to investigate. We often used terms such as ‘replicas’, ‘reproductions’, ‘copies’, and ‘repetitions’ interchangeably, without really defining their nuances. Months later, when refining the exhibition text, we still got caught up with trying to distill terms such as ‘authenticity’, ‘faithfulness’, and ‘accuracy’. <img width="606" height="745" width_o="606" height_o="745" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c5cba724fd294228d9768ced12169050b52545d470a5678f576c95ba9e9717e5/03a_Texts-with-Berny.jpeg" data-mid="129603838" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/606/i/c5cba724fd294228d9768ced12169050b52545d470a5678f576c95ba9e9717e5/03a_Texts-with-Berny.jpeg" /> <img width="606" height="755" width_o="606" height_o="755" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7bff61c249850ba931aa10d42689288b1498f34d9d272409ca47786dc22d66d9/03b_Texts-with-Berny.jpeg" data-mid="129603839" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/606/i/7bff61c249850ba931aa10d42689288b1498f34d9d272409ca47786dc22d66d9/03b_Texts-with-Berny.jpeg" /> Texts with Berny, discussing the language of our exhibition write-up Looking back now, these terms were all red herrings. What we were examining with Bad Imitation in fact goes beyond the surface-level study of ‘copying’ and ‘repeating’ as artistic strategies—strategies that many artists rely upon, in one way or another. This became more obvious to us as we went through the process of putting together the list of artists for this show. Certain types of imitation didn’t seem to work for this project; in particular, imitation that was too stiff, too cold, too technical. And certain types of imitation did, although we couldn’t really articulate the reasons beyond some shared sense that they ‘had the right feeling’. It seemed that we were making an effort to bring together practices that, in their respective acts of imitation, possessed some ability to evoke a rich emotive landscape. <img width="606" height="555" width_o="606" height_o="555" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/8d60ac5d2cc8f40bde85f3177b034b06526325c5fb619ed0cb87f7b32388779c/04a_Texts-with-Berny-about-artists.jpeg" data-mid="129603840" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/606/i/8d60ac5d2cc8f40bde85f3177b034b06526325c5fb619ed0cb87f7b32388779c/04a_Texts-with-Berny-about-artists.jpeg" /> <img width="602" height="590" width_o="602" height_o="590" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/4accf0d9fba9fda288145230c7884911c13891bfa59269346be2bbdb861f6f3c/04b_Texts-with-Berny-about-artists.jpeg" data-mid="129603841" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/602/i/4accf0d9fba9fda288145230c7884911c13891bfa59269346be2bbdb861f6f3c/04b_Texts-with-Berny-about-artists.jpeg" /> Texts with Berny, discussing artists we ultimately did not include in the exhibition It was Berny who first noted that our interest was not in the (re)produced object itself, but rather in the ‘gap’ that might be opened up by a given work, a gap between the copy and the original. We were captivated by this mysterious negative space—the site, perhaps, of that ‘rich emotive landscape’—and the copies and their originals were just bookending that space. In many ways, this reflects much of what this exhibition is about: an in-between, a place created through difference and contrast, more felt than real. With each artist we contacted, each subsequent proposal for how an artwork could operate within that ‘gap’, we inched closer to defining the blurry boundaries of what a ‘bad imitation’ is and could do. THE ‘BAD’ IN BAD IMITATIONThe use of the word ‘bad’ is a sleight of hand. It sets up a duality with what is ‘good’—or original, or authentic, or faithful—but this is not our exhibition’s premise. Bad Imitation is not against perfection, nor is it wholly about failure; it is not about a lack of skill, nor does it challenge the value of art itself. ‘Bad’, in this context, is more of an intentional deviation. One could say it is a provocation, or even a joke. The word is so damning, so flattening, that it causes a recoil. It opens a space for someone to wonder why it was used at all. And so there are in-betweens here, presented by both words in our exhibition’s title. An imitation cannot exist without its original, and its existence emphasises the distance between itself and its source material. An imitation that is deemed ‘bad’ widens that distance, without severing the connection. Calling something ‘bad’ demands an explanation for that value judgment, a negotiation of the space between ‘bad’ and ‘good’. In thinking through the mechanics of the ‘bad imitation’, I look to the subject matter of the artworks in our exhibition. These newly commissioned works reference sources that are commonplace, domestic, everyday, known—the tableaux we observe in public spaces; the objects that surround us in our homes; the scenes we watch on television shows; the words of advice that we receive, which might well be clichés we’ve heard many times before. Even the act of breathing itself, so natural that we are hardly ever conscious of it, is ripe for a bad imitation. <img width="3908" height="2665" width_o="3908" height_o="2665" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/3a982d8dbad062cddd5bc7f3aa304e01fb6c6132848602f70a20d9782a7095e5/05a_Khairullah-Rahim-x-Nghia-Phung.jpg" data-mid="129603842" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/3a982d8dbad062cddd5bc7f3aa304e01fb6c6132848602f70a20d9782a7095e5/05a_Khairullah-Rahim-x-Nghia-Phung.jpg" /> <img width="2880" height="1620" width_o="2880" height_o="1620" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c731226f05b17e1f8576dd7787a1c6e18b7c28b8e63b3ba99f8065627429bbf8/05c_Pat-Toh.png" data-mid="129603844" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/c731226f05b17e1f8576dd7787a1c6e18b7c28b8e63b3ba99f8065627429bbf8/05c_Pat-Toh.png" /> Khairullah Rahim x Nghia Phung, reference image for after-party. Courtesy of the artists. Pat Toh, studies for Air Ways. Courtesy of the artist. While varying in form, the accessibility of these ‘originals’ is no surprise. A bad imitation cannot exist if its viewers have no sense of its original; no capacity to decide if it is ‘bad’ at all. The more relatable and familiar the original, the more material can be created with an imitation’s differences. Something strange must occur: a bad imitation must hold on to enough of its original, must create some image, or feeling, or sense of the original, and at the same time say, “I am not like that thing”. This isn’t to say that the works don’t work if one doesn’t know what they are referencing. It is only to say that they work differently if you do. INFILTRATING THE ORIGINAL The ‘bad imitation’ is thus not defined by its aesthetic, but rather by a process of latching onto, then departing from the original. The artist then slips their intentions into the space of difference generated by this departure. This gap is not physically represented by the object, but rather conjured in our perception. It is created by the artist, and finished in the mind of the viewer. <img width="2880" height="1616" width_o="2880" height_o="1616" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/782c67addf514e923f7feeee7b5aa92547a710df757c883de88bfde16ae4b3d1/06a_Moses-Tan.png" data-mid="129603847" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/782c67addf514e923f7feeee7b5aa92547a710df757c883de88bfde16ae4b3d1/06a_Moses-Tan.png" /> <img width="2466" height="1422" width_o="2466" height_o="1422" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/77011ac037acf9e189ec38b5c227c1aa0bd00d28ece929fabdc9beb4ebd42639/06b_Ashley-Hi.png" data-mid="129603848" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/77011ac037acf9e189ec38b5c227c1aa0bd00d28ece929fabdc9beb4ebd42639/06b_Ashley-Hi.png" /> Moses Tan, still from A whispering of salt. Courtesy of the artist. Ashley Hi, GAN-produced test images for Cable Imgs. Courtesy of the artist. You could call this something insidious, like an infiltration; but it is also something more nebulous, like an absorption. Whichever it is, I think of it as more generative than destructive. I imagine an imitation squeezing into the spaces the original has failed to occupy, and expanding them. For a ‘bad imitation’ is not ‘badly done’; it does not destroy its connections to the original by failing to represent it at all. A ‘bad imitation’ done well, is one that possesses a form of uncanniness, which lingers and tints the viewer’s perception of the source material. It locates the mental space that the original occupies in the viewer’s mind, then stays there, even after the viewer leaves the exhibition.&nbsp; This is what a good ‘bad imitation’ does—it becomes part of the original. And so, as you walk through Bad Imitation, I recommend sitting with these works and trying to look at them in two ways. First, pretend you have no idea what each work is referencing. Then, actively compare it to its original. Think about how these imitations deviate from their source, but more importantly, note what these deviations do to you as a viewer. Perhaps when you next encounter the original, outside of the exhibition space, you will instead think of that time when you saw its bad imitation. Editor’s Noteby Berny Tan I was meant to write a curatorial note of my own, to be paired with Daniel’s. I had even started composing an outline in my head. I would first discuss patterns of behaviour that we subconsciously develop over the course of our lives, and how those patterns might have roots in our childhood experiences—in our ‘imitations’ of the adults who brought us up, who were in turn imitating the adults who raised them. I would mention how, if we are lucky enough to develop an awareness of these patterns, we might learn how to reinforce the good and reorient the bad. Then, I would lead into how artists constantly return to similar ways of working, similar subjects; grapple with them again and again, although they might approach them a little differently each time. I would have talked, too, about how a curator might loop back to similar (types of) artists and artworks across different projects. Eventually, I would meditate on whether we are always aiming for—not just bad imitations, but worse ones. I mean that in the sense that as we grow and learn, we keep trying to do better, to build on but also distinguish ourselves from what came before. Or something along those lines. It would have been an interesting enough text, I think, if I could have pulled it off. Instead, I have chosen to let Daniel’s words represent this exhibition we have curated together. Well, perhaps it isn’t entirely accurate to say “Daniel’s words”. While Daniel wrote the original version, he gave me leeway afterwards to tease out and clarify his ideas. He didn’t mind that I took some artistic licence, and integrated some of my own style of prose into his essay. I rephrased entire sentences; replaced more than a few words; elaborated on his statements in ways that didn’t bother to emulate Daniel’s style. I have never been so aggressive in my editing, nor has a text written by somebody else ever taken me this long to work through. So there is quite a lot of myself in the essay, in fact; things I can’t imagine Daniel saying or writing. He was very generous in giving me space for this indulgence. (He would tell me, later, that seeing the essay evolve in my hands was like watching a ‘live’ bad imitation.) Despite the liberties I took with his essay, it doesn’t feel right to say it was co-written by us. The text still belongs to Daniel; my role was simply to better articulate what Daniel meant to convey, and to do so in a way that remains true to the thought processes that underpinned this exhibition. Since Bad Imitation grew out of Daniel’s practice, it felt right for his ideas to be foregrounded. As a curator, I don’t know if I would have come up with anything like Bad Imitation on my own. I think this exhibition could have existed, in some form, without me, but it would not have existed without Daniel. <img width="3785" height="1962" width_o="3785" height_o="1962" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/1d306c5df67f54f80437a87a1ddb6e0c7b32a90907c4d0b17c16e4bc5d992181/07_Michael-Lee.jpeg" data-mid="129603849" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/1d306c5df67f54f80437a87a1ddb6e0c7b32a90907c4d0b17c16e4bc5d992181/07_Michael-Lee.jpeg" /> Michael Lee, Not Artistic Advice (detail), 2022. Badge buttons with print on paper, matte lamination and pin backing, 3.8 x 3.8 cm each. Image courtesy of the artist. I have been wondering if I am not so much co-curating an exhibition with Daniel, as much as curating Daniel curating an exhibition. His curatorial projects often begin as extensions of the ideas in his art practice; the exhibition form is a methodology for him to better understand those ideas, and how they emerge in different ways in practices beyond his own. Though I am deeply involved in Bad Imitation, as deeply as I am with any of my personal curatorial projects, I’ve also felt a certain distance from it. Not in a bad way—not in the way of not feeling ownership over the exhibition—but I understand that I am here, in part, to shape the arena for Daniel’s ideas to flourish. Nonetheless, I view this essay as a joint effort, representative of our collaborative style of curating. It is a partnership built on mutual support and inherent trust. It’s the sort of trust you’d have to have in someone to allow them to take apart your writing, then put it back together again, knowing that it would still be recognisable as yours. It means I can send Daniel a text like this: i feel like i’m ship of theseusing1 your essay i’m like replacing the words but trying to retain its essence and he will respond not with frustration or offence, but with: Somehow apt But omg hahahaha 1&nbsp; &nbsp; The Ship of Theseus is a thought experiment in Western philosophy. It raises the question of whether an object that has had all of its components replaced—such as a ship whose wooden parts decayed over time—remains fundamentally the same object. <img width="1962" height="2944" width_o="1962" height_o="2944" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/625c1234e3d90e7a59bb5c43d696a9493fbbbff7a9d6ffb830ffc7f03617dd53/Daniel-Chong.png" data-mid="129604160" border="0" data-no-zoom src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/625c1234e3d90e7a59bb5c43d696a9493fbbbff7a9d6ffb830ffc7f03617dd53/Daniel-Chong.png" /> BiographyDaniel Chong (b. 1995, Singapore) is an artist-curator whose curatorial approach grows from the curiosities within his artistic practice. Drawing from the often uncanny nature of affect, his projects read as extended artistic experiments within the loose framework of an exhibition. Independently, he has curated Melting! Melting! (2019) at Gillman Barracks and RAID (2016) at Tiong Bahru Air Raid Shelter. He was also Assistant Curator of the non-profit arts organisation OH! Open House from 2019 to 2021. Follow Website Instagram <img width="1591" height="2387" width_o="1591" height_o="2387" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/dd64a22de8ff884de046164ddadc11ef851d3ec6312ae8d4ca4e3e28c481dce9/Headshot_Berny-Tan.png" data-mid="129604172" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/dd64a22de8ff884de046164ddadc11ef851d3ec6312ae8d4ca4e3e28c481dce9/Headshot_Berny-Tan.png" /> BiographyBerny Tan (b. 1990, Singapore) is an artist, curator, and writer. Her interdisciplinary practice explores the tensions that arise when she applies systems to—and unearths systems in—her personal experiences, complicating the false binary between rational and emotional. As an independent curator, she has developed a practice built on principles of empathy, sensitivity, and close collaboration with artists, accompanied by approachable writing that illuminates the processes and materialities of art-making. Tan holds an MA (Dist) in Contemporary Art Theory from Goldsmiths, University of London, and a BFA (Hons) in Visual and Critical Studies from the School of Visual Arts. Recent curatorial projects include Recast (2021) at starch, and Maybe we read too much into things (2021) at 72-13. Follow Website Instagram https://badimitation.com/Ashley-Hi Wed, 22 Dec 2021 08:18:52 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Ashley-Hi <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/b95eb2013fb173a6332dd87ccba3bca9e625ad2dfe1e15f8e9b3819419344bcb/Ashley-WIP-01-2.png" data-mid="129621608" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/b95eb2013fb173a6332dd87ccba3bca9e625ad2dfe1e15f8e9b3819419344bcb/Ashley-WIP-01-2.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/58d92c0c33a098bc82b21a5f1333d706d1ecab5d663b6553ee387c6f12f1f9a4/Ashley-WIP-02-2.png" data-mid="129621609" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/58d92c0c33a098bc82b21a5f1333d706d1ecab5d663b6553ee387c6f12f1f9a4/Ashley-WIP-02-2.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/fc1480961c0967c2670e568301dbd9dce0e6e273c44f5d810808df156c9ce33b/Ashley-WIP-03-2.png" data-mid="129621610" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/fc1480961c0967c2670e568301dbd9dce0e6e273c44f5d810808df156c9ce33b/Ashley-WIP-03-2.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/864dee5ec96219d78ebc82504c56d95fbbf46e8c8905f434f8291241082a0ccc/Ashley-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129208110" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/864dee5ec96219d78ebc82504c56d95fbbf46e8c8905f434f8291241082a0ccc/Ashley-WIP-06.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/2945a5d161b678f7fa9bba9286e7b830605955aabd23e27ee6ebfbbf7ebbd458/Ashley-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129208109" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/2945a5d161b678f7fa9bba9286e7b830605955aabd23e27ee6ebfbbf7ebbd458/Ashley-WIP-05.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/84414674d6b1143befb834105e37b5ec5668f3e2fa6bfea6d43603ef021689bb/Ashley-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129208108" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/84414674d6b1143befb834105e37b5ec5668f3e2fa6bfea6d43603ef021689bb/Ashley-WIP-04.png" /> Title Cable Imgs Year 2022 Medium GAN-produced images, vinyl stickersDimensions 232.5 cm x 313.5 cm; 60 x 60 cm each This work comprises a series of images produced using a generative adversarial network (GAN), which has been trained on a dataset of photographs documenting cable management in visual art exhibition spaces. Based on this dataset, the network uses context encoding to generate the contents of an arbitrary image region. Each image is thus a speculative proposal for how cables—usually a marginal, supporting aspect of exhibition-making—might be organised in an exhibition space. The network has a sensibility of its own, creating logical outcomes that possess a strong resonance across images, as well as with the original dataset and our own experiences of exhibition spaces. Still, the images retain distinctly digital textures, appearing at times hypnotic, even painterly in their abstractions. Presented as a large floor-based collage alongside smaller interventions in other areas of the exhibition space, this work is at once cheekily self-referential and a sincere engagement with the generative possibilities of machine learning. Interview with the artist Q Curators This particular work is a sequel to a previous project (Browsing Copy), in which you similarly trained a generative adversarial network (GAN) on a dataset of visual art exhibition venues. Why the focus on such spaces, and why the decision to zoom in on cable management specifically? A Ashley Hi I'm interested in exhibition spaces in part because as an artist, I visit them often, but more so because they have a consistency in terms of their visual structure. Although individual exhibitions can look and feel very different, they are almost always composed of classifiable elements such as walls, doorways, wall-mounted objects, and free-standing floor-based objects. These factors make suitable parameters for training a model to produce its own variations and speculations of spaces, based on an existing dataset. Similarly, when looking at cable use and management within visual art exhibitions, there is simultaneously a consistency and yet a huge variety of styles in their presentation—sleek and organised on the one hand, and extremely messy and tangled on the other. It’s entertaining to me to look out for how cables are managed in each new show I visit. It made me think about what would happen if we left cable management up to a machine, and how the continued generation of images could be an endless source of enjoyment. Q Curators What drives your interest in machine learning, particularly in using models that are by nature imitative and predictive? A Ashley Hi The most familiar type of machine learning is probably a neural network, which has been used by @ResNeXtGuesser to guess memes or by r/SubSimulatorGPT2 to simulate entire subreddits. Instead of image detection or text generation, my interest is in image generation using techniques such as pix2pix, which is a conditional generative adversarial network (CGAN). A generator produces an image as close as possible to an original image provided, and a discriminator decides whether the image is a produced or original image. This way, the model learns to approximate images that are closer and closer to the original source. To the machine, this whole process is about iterative optimisation, in which every input and output is mapped in a deterministic way. But I find myself amused by how the results produced almost never pass as ‘real’ or ‘human’ enough, despite the robust process of machine learning. This is why I enjoy it as an iterative or generative tool for obsessive repetition, which opens up new areas of speculation. Q Curators This is one of the few projects you’ve done in which there are no kinetic elements. Why have you decided to step away from that aspect of your practice? A Ashley Hi Many of my previous kinetic pieces were very much based on algorithms and how they are able to produce interesting types of motion. switchArray (2019) is controlled by an algorithm based on Conway's Game of Life, A Video of Pigeons (2019) is based on an algorithm modelling a normal distribution, and Light Wind (2017) uses an algorithm to constantly update motion based on relative position. I am still interested in exploring these algorithms as they provide generative results without me having to design or animate every single frame to create liveness. With Cable Imgs, instead of having algorithms produce movement, they are used to produce visuals. Even though there is no kinetic aspect to this work, it is not so different from what I have explored in my practice. The focus is still on a self-sustaining continuity, except that in this work it's about a continuity of texture and context. <img width="1619" height="2429" width_o="1619" height_o="2429" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d3409e859cda1505a6f0e27d3cc6ec2e65c4cd8d16d8cff1b25b87f20de85aa5/Ashley-Hi.png" data-mid="129110489" border="0" data-no-zoom src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d3409e859cda1505a6f0e27d3cc6ec2e65c4cd8d16d8cff1b25b87f20de85aa5/Ashley-Hi.png" /> BiographyAshley Hi (b. 1999, Singapore) is a visual artist who utilises kinetic sculpture and installation to explore medium, material, and movement. Her works blend art, technology, and data to create sensory spaces and generative experiences through algorithm and design. She holds a degree in Digital Arts Computing from Goldsmiths, University of London. FollowWebsite Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎ https://badimitation.com/Catherine-Hu Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:25:00 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Catherine-Hu <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/fc334c3359178e706b6763f00a0126a01ca1bbd85b4703d358e4af8c47288b1d/Catherine-WIP-01.png" data-mid="129208714" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/fc334c3359178e706b6763f00a0126a01ca1bbd85b4703d358e4af8c47288b1d/Catherine-WIP-01.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/5744353c80f23083718be927b724b7aa0a39324a94fe9d05c0963aa71f205c31/Catherine-WIP-02.png" data-mid="129621950" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/5744353c80f23083718be927b724b7aa0a39324a94fe9d05c0963aa71f205c31/Catherine-WIP-02.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/1103bd7f016a0b221789794abe7f7f3da909a2df39c86fcf833f939971f8d84a/Catherine-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129208717" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/1103bd7f016a0b221789794abe7f7f3da909a2df39c86fcf833f939971f8d84a/Catherine-WIP-04.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ba09640d74c5b08e5532c44c5062120dc84518f681f3733bbbd3a77014446168/Catherine-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129621951" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/ba09640d74c5b08e5532c44c5062120dc84518f681f3733bbbd3a77014446168/Catherine-WIP-04.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a8ac65fa5c62932047af63287efbdbad54055b9af7cfb252008853446633f025/Catherine-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129208713" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a8ac65fa5c62932047af63287efbdbad54055b9af7cfb252008853446633f025/Catherine-WIP-06.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/23b7c0c7aa25b3c0b83107ee15621aaf03a304f28ecaa49d8fb83dd73fcda8f9/Catherine-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129208718" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/23b7c0c7aa25b3c0b83107ee15621aaf03a304f28ecaa49d8fb83dd73fcda8f9/Catherine-WIP-05.png" /> Title Twice as Far Away (Blue Tile Table) Year 2021 Medium Cardboard, PVC, acrylic paint, concrete Dimensions 100 x 100 x 40 cm Title Twice as Far Away (Iron-and-Wood Park Benches) Year 2021 Medium Painted cast resin, stained wood Dimensions 60 x 25 x 30 cm each These two works are the latest in a series of sculptures based on public furniture. One is a set comprising a table and six seats, covered in blue tiles except for a white-tiled chessboard design on the table’s surface. The other is a pair of benches with wooden seats, supported by wrought iron frames featuring botanical motifs. Both are common sights in Singapore; part of the vernacular of local public housing estates and parks. Here, these handmade replicas appear to have been faithfully, almost obsessively reproduced, save for the fact that they have been made at half the size of their real-life counterparts. The adjustment of a single element—their scale—has altered these recognisable objects’ function and context, shifting them into a space just bordering on the absurd. Positioned in the vicinity of the exhibition space’s actual fire hose reel, itself a fixture in public spaces, the sculptures humorously flicker between reality and illusion, nudging the viewer to reassess the otherwise familiar. Interview with the artist Q Curators Your practice is built around the examination of everyday objects, or otherwise inconspicuous aspects of our daily lives. What is it that you find so fascinating about them? What, to you, is the effect (or affect) of reducing scale in the copies that you make of public ‘furniture’? Across your projects, you have constantly engaged with the act of replication. How did you come to develop this methodology, and why have you found yourself returning to it again and again? A Catherine Hu To me, the questions of scale, replication, and the everyday are intertwined. In my sculpture, I’ve always liked making maquettes (scale models). They help me visualise what my work will look like, and let me run myself through the fabrication process before I commit to working on a larger scale. Even before I was conscious of replication as a method, my work had always involved it to some degree—the final work being a scaled-up replica of its own model. As I was learning more about conceptual art, I found it increasingly difficult to justify making things, and making things at that ‘larger scale’. If the ‘idea’ is the point, why spend weeks making something when you could describe it in words, or save your precious time on Earth for something more important? What is the difference between, say, seeing the words, “curtain made of needles”, versus an actual curtain made of needles, or a drawing of a curtain made of needles? What was gained by making a model ‘life-sized’—when clearly the maquette communicated everything that was essential to the ‘idea’? With a bit of trick photography you could even make a maquette look life-sized for your Instagram. I first approached this ‘scaling-down-of’ process through thinking about functionality—if I take this outdoor trash can and make it smaller it becomes more like an indoor trash can; if I take this bench and make it smaller it becomes a bench for cats, etc. I thought of it as a means to take recognisable entities and allow them to exist in a different context, to be used and interacted with differently, in ways that are both familiar and not. I tried to be as accurate as possible in the copies such that the size of it would be what broke the illusion of realness, to reveal the ‘made-ness’ of the readymade. After making these sculptures, it became obvious that I’d also answered my question of why you can’t just stop at the maquette. Right now, I still can’t fully explain why I’ve been using public furniture as a subject except that I like them. I like how specific they are—how recognisable they can be to some people when they can be completely foreign to others. I like how anonymous they are, in the way that vernacular design sometimes is. I even like them purely because they let me sit down. For the blue tile table in particular, I like how simple it is. At its most basic, it is just two different colours applied to two different shapes of tiles. I enjoy how the structural element of the tile-grid has been dragged into doing double duty, by also producing the chessboard patterns. I have also explored replication and scale in other mediums. While I was developing my sculptural practice, I was simultaneously learning screen printing—an industrial printing process that was most famously co-opted by Andy Warhol as an artistic technique. Although print allows for the repetition of the same image, such that you can’t differentiate the ‘original’ from its ‘copies’, the medium actually made me more aware that all readymades had been ‘made’ once. The printed pattern on some old fabric I’d found had been designed and put there by someone, and when I printed patterns on fabric, I was potentially becoming that someone for someone else. Printing also made me think differently about scale. Since a lot of my file preparation was done digitally, it was never a given what size my images would be. It is so easy to change the size of something on a computer, and so difficult literally anywhere else. Ultimately, as someone whose primary mode of transporting work has often been a public bus, a ‘small and flat’ practice—in both sculpture and print—has always felt extremely appealing. <img width="1928" height="2892" width_o="1928" height_o="2892" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c1328475104492f1ed4d2030525e0f6f1658dc722ddac9b561345f6ff7fe9f7b/Catherine-Hu.png" data-mid="129110785" border="0" data-no-zoom src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/c1328475104492f1ed4d2030525e0f6f1658dc722ddac9b561345f6ff7fe9f7b/Catherine-Hu.png" /> BiographyCatherine Hu (b. 1996, Singapore) is an artist working primarily in sculpture and print media. Her process often involves the act of copying—recreating existing objects to explore the gradient between looking-like and being something. She has exhibited work in solo and two-person shows at gallery no one, Heaven Gallery, and Comfort Station, all art spaces in Chicago, USA. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the School of the Arts Institute of Chicago. Follow Website Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎ https://badimitation.com/Daniel-Chong Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:26:15 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Daniel-Chong <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/1f48a89579689cd9da1e3e0985faeff262cc2513b723ab0fbf0625fac05670f9/Daniel-WIP-01.png" data-mid="129209533" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/1f48a89579689cd9da1e3e0985faeff262cc2513b723ab0fbf0625fac05670f9/Daniel-WIP-01.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/620c541c378905aee9f45e9618214ba5cd426c547c17c47d4c2f13b060087946/Daniel-WIP-02.png" data-mid="129209534" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/620c541c378905aee9f45e9618214ba5cd426c547c17c47d4c2f13b060087946/Daniel-WIP-02.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6c03a9a6d885d068d49e681379a5af35c9958ff0d30c21dbeefaf4531f67b73a/Daniel-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129209532" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6c03a9a6d885d068d49e681379a5af35c9958ff0d30c21dbeefaf4531f67b73a/Daniel-WIP-06.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7a70d6d0d1984e584bbc7eaba3bd732ef4afb54d60f0be08d9b84dd802d77b52/Daniel-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129209536" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/7a70d6d0d1984e584bbc7eaba3bd732ef4afb54d60f0be08d9b84dd802d77b52/Daniel-WIP-04.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/232f11f8d2a811b9014dd7da06980eeaff67e75873141f2b905a3f8d83f0304b/Daniel-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129209537" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/232f11f8d2a811b9014dd7da06980eeaff67e75873141f2b905a3f8d83f0304b/Daniel-WIP-05.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6eb131c5639543c20bd015806fcd393a2cf11a84028a83f3b0c170a63e0d0b2d/Daniel-WIP-03.png" data-mid="129209535" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6eb131c5639543c20bd015806fcd393a2cf11a84028a83f3b0c170a63e0d0b2d/Daniel-WIP-03.png" /> Title Unintended vessels Year 2022 Medium Cut plastic storage boxes, used clothes, stuffed toys, resin, silicone Dimensions Dimensions variable This series of sculptures centres the unassuming plastic storage box as an unexpected mnemonic device. On its face an entirely utilitarian and forgettable object, this everyday vessel somehow manages to become a conduit for poignant domesticity—a reminder of the little-used, sometimes sentimental possessions that have been neatly packed in similar boxes in our homes. In this installation, the boxes are filled with clothes, toys, and memorabilia, organised and repeated, all pressing against the translucent plastic as if suspended in a fog. Stranger still, they appear to be emerging, or perhaps receding into, the floors and the walls of the exhibition space. These surreal vitrines thus exist in a strange limbo between functionality and sentimentality, uncannily standing in for the things we hold onto, yet put away; rarely use, yet cannot bear to discard; wish to keep out of sight, yet might one day choose to revisit. Interview with the artist Q Berny Tan In recent years, you’ve moved away from using found objects as they are, and instead manipulate them, or even fabricate objects outright. Why this transition? A Daniel Chong This might seem counterintuitive, but this transition has allowed me to achieve a greater sense of reality in my works. I realised that people often remember things wrongly, in the sense that our perception and memories of objects are always more perfect than reality. Take for example the biscuit replicas I had made in my earlier series Absurd Intimacies—no one noticed that the colours were entirely wrong, and many even mis-remembered the brands of some of the biscuits. It was around then that it dawned on me that people don’t always know what they know, but instead have more of a connotative field of objects that they amalgamate over a period of time. By using found objects on their own, I cannot tap into that connotative subconscious that people have of said object. It's almost as if the real object is the bad imitation. The process of manipulation and fabrication gives me more room to play with the psychological image of the object, and to think of its materiality in terms of conceptual connotations rather than faithfulness to physical appearance. Q Berny Tan This series began initially with your interest in the plastic storage box. Could you explain why this object has captivated you? A Daniel Chong The plastic storage box is an everyday object with so much potential. It recedes into the background, yet is ever-present as a vessel to hold objects. In particular, it is used to store things that are only used occasionally, or that don’t serve a practical function, but are still kept for sentimental reasons. So, the phenomenology of the box is never just about the box itself, but what it holds. It is this strange connotative puzzle—a not-quite-standalone object that is always remembered and seen as being filled or used. Its function constitutes its appearance, and our experience of it. In thinking about this object, I keenly felt the paradox of everyday aesthetics that permeates my practice. In exalting or presenting the everyday in an exhibitionary context, it betrays the setting in which it is experienced. My interest in the box eventually evolved into an attempt to overcome this paradox between function and aesthetics. As an object, it is deceptively easy to work with—almost too perfect as a metaphor to talk about quiet domestic spaces, while also being a literal vessel with both interior and exterior spaces that I could play with. Yet, it resists artistic intervention, unless I go to the extent of entirely effacing it. In that case, any other box or molten plastic would suffice, rendering the materiality of the plastic storage box pointless. On the other hand, leaving it too unaltered makes it too utilitarian in its affect, which would jolt it out of the art space and context. This unassuming box thus became both my bane and my muse, as I sought to balance all these connotations. Q Berny Tan The tableaux that you create in your installations often present the domestic intersecting with the surreal. What about this combination is so compelling for you? A Daniel Chong I don’t actually view it as a combination, but rather a kind of inception. I’ve always been trying to tap into the vernacular, domestic space, be it in presentation or materiality. It’s such a ripe area to work with: it is both an important part of our daily lived experiences, yet it functions so monotonously, and efficiently, that it disappears. While not epic nor grand, the domestic affects us quite insidiously. I see my work as almost hijacking this space, rewiring the connotative possibilities for the viewer, so that the next time they see or use said object, my intervention slips in there as well. I constantly ask myself how I can affix small affective textures onto the objects we already use, so that I can slightly displace, lay atop, skim, or shift ever so gently the gradients of the viewer’s everyday experiences. This is why my works are always integrated into their surrounding spaces—almost eliminating the boundaries they have with the viewer—yet also sit very squarely in a kind of altered reality, a space that is uncanny yet plausibly real. This inception is stretched just enough that the work isn’t entirely removed from its original references, allowing the viewer to dwell with the object and its extended emotive surfaces. <img width="1962" height="2944" width_o="1962" height_o="2944" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/625c1234e3d90e7a59bb5c43d696a9493fbbbff7a9d6ffb830ffc7f03617dd53/Daniel-Chong.png" data-mid="129111188" border="0" data-no-zoom src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/625c1234e3d90e7a59bb5c43d696a9493fbbbff7a9d6ffb830ffc7f03617dd53/Daniel-Chong.png" /> BiographyDaniel Chong (b. 1995, Singapore) is a sculptor working in the expanded field of affect, delving into social constructs around human emotions. From strength to grief to intimacy, Chong engages with materialism as a means to unearth our emotive connections through objects. His practice is characterised by the ability to upend traditional understandings of objects through subtle and often minute interventions. Chong holds a BA (Hons) in Fine Arts from LASALLE College of the Arts. His recent exhibitions include a solo presentation at 1a space in Hong Kong and participation in the OSTRALE Biennale O21 in Dresden, Germany. Follow Website Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎ https://badimitation.com/Khairullah-Rahim-x-Nghia-Phung Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:27:00 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Khairullah-Rahim-x-Nghia-Phung <img width="1440" height="1920" width_o="1440" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/5d796f8e3a8dcb78b5ba31b85e5e5906788d38d53f516c4ab1bb002c5b1658e2/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-01.png" data-mid="129622478" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/5d796f8e3a8dcb78b5ba31b85e5e5906788d38d53f516c4ab1bb002c5b1658e2/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-01.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0833524ea678ede27ca86a6bf4fa98404e3c48d7b79eccbff27c7aeda4184fb3/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-02.png" data-mid="129210676" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/0833524ea678ede27ca86a6bf4fa98404e3c48d7b79eccbff27c7aeda4184fb3/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-02.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/2764dcae66c5b608f88594bf5fd811247329729b743195db5475de1965e6657d/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-03.png" data-mid="129210678" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/2764dcae66c5b608f88594bf5fd811247329729b743195db5475de1965e6657d/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-03.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/fea3693a782fc60e170397cce4a404a252f0a244c574ae573592a160821cba2b/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129210685" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/fea3693a782fc60e170397cce4a404a252f0a244c574ae573592a160821cba2b/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-06.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/5ea64acd57c01025936837361b9332f3272b91d1016ab16a3e6e6f1c490061ff/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129210683" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/5ea64acd57c01025936837361b9332f3272b91d1016ab16a3e6e6f1c490061ff/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-05.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/733ccc14776a493df79bd1812017c48c945f3dc6808dae150b8b64acda4b9554/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129210680" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/733ccc14776a493df79bd1812017c48c945f3dc6808dae150b8b64acda4b9554/Khairullah-Nghia-WIP-04.png" /> Title after-party Year 2022 Medium Found objects, readymades, potted plants Dimensions Dimensions variable This collaborative work references ‘stray objects’ that the artists have regularly observed in working class neighbourhoods. In such settings, these seemingly random domestic objects—such as a massage chair, a stationary bicycle, and even a parasol—appear to be abandoned, yet have actually been transformed into makeshift storage, shelter, or resting spaces outside of the home. Their presence in common areas defiantly disrupts the boundaries between public and private, but also possesses a secondary contradiction: their resourceful ‘owners’ must accept that the objects and their functions will always be the subject of surveillance, and may even be cleared away outright without warning. As a result, what might otherwise be a welcome space of respite for a resident or worker is also a precarious space of hostility. To explore the complex social dynamics of this phenomenon, the artists have constructed a dense landscape of secondhand objects and furniture, uncannily accented with readymades that heighten the theatricality of the original arrangements. Interview with the artistsQ Curators This installation was inspired by the objects and scenes one often encounters in liminal public spaces around housing estates. What attracted you to these scenes initially, and what do they represent in the context of this work? A Khairullah Rahim In developing this work, we constantly revisited questions such as, “How does rest look like for working class folks? Is rest something everyone can afford? Is rest safe?” Rather than focusing on everyday objects as individual components and the liminal nature of the spaces they inhabit, our work attempts to highlight the inconspicuous hostilities which often loom over resting sites. From our observations, the cluttering of seemingly abandoned household objects in working class neighbourhoods—outside of the actual residential spaces—are a common sight. But hoarding and clutter is not exclusively an issue for the economically challenged. The rich are familiar with it too, except they can afford to keep it obscured. Clutter is more visible for people like us, because having extra space for shelter and storage is a luxury many of us cannot afford. Furthermore, these gatherings of stray objects often transform otherwise cold and unutilised (public) spaces into makeshift lounging spots. But at what cost? Concerns over safety hazards and associated risks are just as important and very real. Often unnoticed, our corridors and staircases have become hostile contested spaces kept under constant watch; where you rest and lounge at your own risk. Q Curators On the one hand, you’ve placed an importance on being ‘faithful’ to the sensibility of the original scenes—for example, by collecting secondhand objects that people were giving away or selling at low prices. On the other hand, this work also stems from a strong intention to stage; to design this performative version of reality. How do you balance these tensions? A Nghia Phung One of several things that really struck me while living in Singapore in the past couple of years is the interactions I’ve had with these everyday objects along the corridors. In our attempt to make sense of things, these seemingly frivolous objects often play a significant role in shaping our ideas and speculations around the personalities and living conditions of their owners. With after-party, we wanted to establish a lingering sense of familiarity through the configuration, placement, and pairing of these found objects. A Khairullah Rahim ‘Balance’ is something we both raised up quite a bit in the process of materialising this work. It was crucial for us that we try to emulate the original scenes, but we were also very aware and certain that we did not want to make a direct replica or reproduction. We both acknowledged that there is an effortless and ingenious quality about how these makeshift lounges were formed. There were definitely creative parameters put in place as well; nothing too funny, nothing too “trying”, cheap and free things only, nothing too specific, and flamboyant objects (but not too dramatic) are always welcome. Taking chances and being spontaneous were also aspects we were very keen on from the beginning. Q Curators How did this collaboration come about? How have your individual practices influenced the development of this work? A Nghia Phung We got acquainted through a mutual friend when Khairullah was looking for models to photograph for a separate work. He later asked if I would like to work together with him for another project. Perhaps you could say that after-party is one of the many iterations of that ongoing research. Working on this project has definitely challenged my perceptions to consider alternative ways of reading objects; rethinking its functions and histories. A Khairullah Rahim I think it is also important to note that both of us were already experimenting with approaches that were inter- or multidisciplinary in nature, and that involved collaborative efforts. Having Nghia Phung on board for this presentation really opened up so many new viewpoints for me that would have probably gone unnoticed otherwise. Our respective sensibilities with regard to ideas and aesthetics are clearly dissimilar and at times even contradictory, but in my opinion, that kind of unanticipated energy was what both of us were desperately looking for throughout the entire process. <img width="1719" height="2579" width_o="1719" height_o="2579" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/b7c9e792281b1399cbc16b1d2252adab2c318a5b030364fb3963bf2dae03b34a/Khairullah-Rahim.png" data-mid="129112741" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/b7c9e792281b1399cbc16b1d2252adab2c318a5b030364fb3963bf2dae03b34a/Khairullah-Rahim.png" /> BiographyKhairullah Rahim (b. 1987, Singapore) works across objects and their replicas, installation, painting, and the moving image. His practice looks into strategies of resourcefulness in an environment of surveillance, and has a particular focus on marginalised communities. This is further informed by the emotional conflicts stemming from his upbringing in a working class family from an ethnic minority. Khairullah’s work has been exhibited in the Singapore Biennale (2019), as well as in solo and group presentations in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Currently, he is an adjunct lecturer at his alma mater, LASALLE College of the Arts (Singapore) and a MFA Visual Arts candidate at Rutgers University, New Jersey. He is represented by Yavuz Gallery (Singapore/Sydney). Follow Website Instagram <img width="2015" height="3022" width_o="2015" height_o="3022" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ff6d9fc53d8d1143ad12d229d078b2e404698749b45419fc971bd7fa8800cd4d/Nghia-Phung.png" data-mid="129112738" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/ff6d9fc53d8d1143ad12d229d078b2e404698749b45419fc971bd7fa8800cd4d/Nghia-Phung.png" /> BiographyNghia Phung (b. 1999, Vietnam) is a graphic designer currently studying Design Communication at LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore. His work often incorporates both graphical elements and photographs, experimenting with shifts and transitions across time and dimension. Follow Website Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎ https://badimitation.com/Michael-Lee Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:27:35 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Michael-Lee <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/756045e07e97facbd9c936002cc7ff0dab83b0eb8ca40178fdee0b5e76cf7abb/Michael-WIP-01.png" data-mid="129623132" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/756045e07e97facbd9c936002cc7ff0dab83b0eb8ca40178fdee0b5e76cf7abb/Michael-WIP-01.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/4b3e8afd72563d276856183a67999cb4a110cfaf6313931c48a8e656ce921225/Michael-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129623138" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/4b3e8afd72563d276856183a67999cb4a110cfaf6313931c48a8e656ce921225/Michael-WIP-06.png" /> <img width="1288" height="1920" width_o="1288" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/f420784d475899bc12e15febd494a04f40714b58d094086ff048c48c4f398659/Michael-WIP-02.png" data-mid="129623133" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/f420784d475899bc12e15febd494a04f40714b58d094086ff048c48c4f398659/Michael-WIP-02.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/17ebbc110966b4cf546035c296345811de3601b53106b9d12a21158b52205841/Michael-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129623136" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/17ebbc110966b4cf546035c296345811de3601b53106b9d12a21158b52205841/Michael-WIP-05.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1280" width_o="1920" height_o="1280" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/96209a1feb2950d9b0d1d2bf32f3b756910f404076b3bc6f295d3f0ed0c75e78/Michael-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129623135" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/96209a1feb2950d9b0d1d2bf32f3b756910f404076b3bc6f295d3f0ed0c75e78/Michael-WIP-04.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/65c193080c47f04dcaddb137822f68769aad0b021004a0c32b8820258842f12a/Michael-WIP-07.png" data-mid="129623139" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/65c193080c47f04dcaddb137822f68769aad0b021004a0c32b8820258842f12a/Michael-WIP-07.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1920" width_o="1920" height_o="1920" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/e323df9e8fd2ad130a749dc0a875f5ba0c283d71b6b9b5f7121d693853550969/Michael-WIP-03.png" data-mid="129623134" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/e323df9e8fd2ad130a749dc0a875f5ba0c283d71b6b9b5f7121d693853550969/Michael-WIP-03.png" /> Title Not Artistic Advice Year 2022 Medium Mixed formats Dimensions Dimensions variable Click here for more information on the mediums and dimensions of this series. This work is an exploration of tips, opinions, and comments given to the artist during his two-decade-long art career. Some have been beneficial, while others were pointless or even harmful, whether they had been offered in privileged settings or freely dispensed with little care. The title, which references the oft-used disclaimer in discussions of personal financing (“This is not financial advice”), expresses a denial that in fact frames the invisible communication that circulates and sustains the dynamics of the art scene. This ‘invisibility’ is reflected in the artist’s use of “background formats”—including navigational signs, badges, and even safety vests worn by the gallery sitters—that appear to be extraneous elements in the exhibition, yet remain a constant presence that cannot be ignored. The work, in all its absurd humour, thus also functions as a mediation of personal and social biographies, offering a partial self-portrait against the backdrop of the art scene in Singapore. Interview with the artistQ Curators Your works in the past few years have been especially focused on text and speech, and the way in which language or information is communicated. What has been driving you to investigate this as a medium? A Michael Lee There is a politics of language that structures power dynamics amongst people in any communicative context, sometimes in unfair ways. Among Singlish users, for instance, there is a difference between those who can and cannot code-switch between Singlish and “proper” English, which allows the former to come across as being more sophisticated, nuanced, or considerate than the latter. The perceived advantage of those with linguistic competence—the multi-linguists, the code switchers, the “better” speakers or writers—becomes directly associated, often in muddled and arbitrary ways, with moral and ethical judgments. Class inequality is often the elephant in the room when evaluating the worth of a person in and through language. My relationship with language in my different roles in art has evolved over time. At first, I saw it as my mission to get the language part right. This was most evident in my earlier curatorial projects, for which much effort was put into the textual aspects of the project, not limited to titling, grammar, proper formatting, credits and acknowledgements, with the often unspoken aim of giving the impression of intelligence, diligence and reliability. Looking back now, these were pursued at the expense of surprise, autonomy, and insight. My more recent artworks examine the limits of language in addressing everyday existence, in particular by developing physical and performative text pieces to stand in for what I could not articulate orally. One example is How Are Things (2018), a large-scale anamorphic text installation addressing MRT commuters from the grandstand of Woodlands Stadium. It was my attempt at reflecting on how such a greeting could be experienced in ways ranging from friendly to distressing. Q Curators This work grew out of a collection of advice – whether good, useless, or even harmful – directed at your art practice or artworks. Why have you chosen to focus on this subject? A Michael Lee I have received quite a lot of advice in my two-decade art career thus far. In the past two months, I have remembered about seventy pieces, and I have barely scratched the surface. Some of the pieces of advice were given upon my request, in youthful innocence or out of desperation, but most of them were unsolicited. I also noticed some ironies in the advice I have received—sometimes they seem to be more about the advisor than the advisee, and sometimes the simplest advice (e.g. “breathe”) actually works for me! Importantly, my opinion and understanding of the different words of advice have changed over time. Like gossip and rumour, art advice exists outside of the public face of art, yet it is the engine that drives and animates artistic identities and relationships. I saw this exhibition as an apt platform to investigate what advice does in the art context. A lot of advice circulated in art and mainstream society are like imperfect copies of one another, which sustain various key myths about artists—consistency, grit, signature style, to name a few—which could be restrictive to an artist’s or a scene’s development. Advice given in the art context often goes undocumented; the effects are invisible, whether benefits are reaped or damage is done. In the best case scenario, a useful piece of advice contributes to an artist's self-awareness, development and achievements. Often though, if the advice is not understood, examined and reflected on in context, it could be harmful. Q Curators What was your motivation for presenting the advice in various textual forms and different modes of dissemination? A Michael Lee The different formats mimic the different contexts that advice is received and responded to. Some advice may be given in passing during a project discussion or a casual chat, while others in a more sustained or professional setting of mentorship or therapy. One’s responses could also range from total rejection to full embracement to plain acknowledgement. Each format also possesses unique implications. Navigation signs, for instance, are crucial for first-time visitors to a building, and can cause one to go around in circles if poorly executed. But they continue to exist in your absence or departure, much like divine truths or water vapour suspended mid-air, hovering over your existence like a kind of restrictive conscience. Still, if there is a consistent thread across the different pieces of advice represented in this project, it would be abstraction. They all have missing details, such as context or the identity of the advisors. This is intentional, aimed at creating open interpretations, which advice in reality tends to suppress. Through a range of formats in this work, I want to purposefully disorientate, confuse, stop visitors in their tracks, or lead them away from their intentions. Hopefully they respond with a touch of humour, even if filled with frustration. No piece of advice in this project can promise good outcomes, but I feel that I have achieved my aim if they create some chuckles. <img width="770" height="1155" width_o="770" height_o="1155" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0efb04b3f931a8c877c21ef76835fe35355f7e5da90850d7e37ad84220616b0a/Michael-Lee.png" data-mid="129113131" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/770/i/0efb04b3f931a8c877c21ef76835fe35355f7e5da90850d7e37ad84220616b0a/Michael-Lee.png" /> BiographyMichael Lee (b. 1972, Singapore) is an artist, curator, and educator. Researching urban memory with an interest in loss, its contexts, and implications, Lee merges personal and social narratives variously into objects, diagrams, situations, curations, and texts. He has presented his work in solo exhibitions at Comma Space and Yavuz Gallery in Singapore, and internationally at Künstlerhaus Bethanien (Berlin, Germany) and Hanart TZ Gallery (Hong Kong). He has also shown extensively in international group exhibitions, such as the Shanghai Biennale 2010 and the Singapore Pavilion at the 2005 World Exposition (Aichi, Japan). His independent curatorial projects include Got room, do things (2018) at Goodman Arts Centre, and what it is about when it is about nothing (2015) at Mizuma Gallery. He was also an Associate Curator of the Singapore Biennale in 2016. Follow Website Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎ https://badimitation.com/Moses-Tan Thu, 23 Dec 2021 08:28:16 +0000 Bad Imitation https://badimitation.com/Moses-Tan <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/723c9223be7aa9601ba5a947c0f4508907884f1fa4487ecae0e36c967e5daa45/Moses-WIP-01.png" data-mid="129211733" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/723c9223be7aa9601ba5a947c0f4508907884f1fa4487ecae0e36c967e5daa45/Moses-WIP-01.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/64a606b99fea75fa174c8c0a6e22ba01fa14c753064af6e9b6afd0547c03a534/Moses-WIP-02.png" data-mid="129211734" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/64a606b99fea75fa174c8c0a6e22ba01fa14c753064af6e9b6afd0547c03a534/Moses-WIP-02.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ff675e8d47dd77cacff2a46260762230d3aaeb47fdb5c10e0637f26de2ec436f/Moses-WIP-03.png" data-mid="129211735" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/ff675e8d47dd77cacff2a46260762230d3aaeb47fdb5c10e0637f26de2ec436f/Moses-WIP-03.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ee4a4ec0ff98f43fa9cc9e965a2f98dfc85aeea295fbb7866af2fbd836e2f541/Moses-WIP-04.png" data-mid="129211736" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/ee4a4ec0ff98f43fa9cc9e965a2f98dfc85aeea295fbb7866af2fbd836e2f541/Moses-WIP-04.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6929ebee56ce4ff8ac081f47dd526739a2c3433de9bf17ae1d986c71be11440f/Moses-WIP-05.png" data-mid="129211737" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6929ebee56ce4ff8ac081f47dd526739a2c3433de9bf17ae1d986c71be11440f/Moses-WIP-05.png" /> <img width="1920" height="1080" width_o="1920" height_o="1080" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/030dfd4aa61109cf52e43a33799d5d2a11697621641fdc4ae6ba3df135a12ecf/Moses-WIP-06.png" data-mid="129211738" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/030dfd4aa61109cf52e43a33799d5d2a11697621641fdc4ae6ba3df135a12ecf/Moses-WIP-06.png" /> Title A whispering of salt Year 2021 – 22 Medium Polymer sculptures, lightbox prints, lightbox, steel table, HD video with sound (07:16) Dimensions Dimensions variable This video installation uses abstracted representations and descriptions of the body as a basis to explore interweaving themes of gossip, melancholy, and narration. It posits an unnamed individual as the subject of an autopsy—a process to determine the cause of demise—as inspired by various ‘true crime’ forensic TV series. In such scenes, speculative, faux-scientific articulations are often framed as fact, yet are also interspersed with personal, even poetic observations that further plot and characterisation. With this narrative structure as a framework, the viewer is presented with an unofficial, poignant account of its anonymous subject’s life and death. From corporeal abstractions that imply rather than accurately depict the body, to lyrical descriptions that transform the meanings of the analytical statements that preceded them, this work is deliberately open-ended in its attempts to approximate the subject’s identity and experiences. Interview with the artistQ Curators Your recent body of work deals with fleshy, abstracted figurations, as compared to more literal depictions of people. What led you to explore such visceral forms? A Moses Tan&nbsp; The explorations started for a solo with Yavuz Gallery, for which I wanted to talk about the experience of coming out without the use of words. I was interested in thinking about forms that could hint at queerness, and began to combine natural objects with textures. In my later explorations, I became quite obsessed with the concept of “queer inhumanisms”1, exemplified by the works of Chicana lesbian photographer Laura Aguilar, who photographed her own body nude amidst natural settings. It was from there that I started thinking more deeply about ideas of bodies, cities, and landscapes (something which I had already delved into in a 2016 video work that looked at the body as an allegorical mountain). The use and discovery of polymer clay, a material usually associated with doll-making, further added to this aspect of my work. I see the sculptures as representations of the desires of a child growing up in a heteronormative world, who had to disavow the so-called ‘feminine’ activity of playing with dolls. 1&nbsp; &nbsp; ‘The encounter with the inhuman expands the term queer past its conventional resonance as a container for human sexual nonnormativities, forcing us to ask, once again, what “sex” and “gender” might look like apart from the anthropocentric forms with which we have become perhaps too familiar.’ Dana Luciano and Mel Y. Chen, “Has the Queer Ever Been Human?”, GLQ 21, no. 2-3 (2015): 189, https://doi.org/10.1215/10642684-2843215. Q Curators A whispering of salt was specifically inspired by the autopsy scenes seen in crime procedural television shows. Why were you drawn to the ‘forensic’ as a motif in this work? A Moses Tan In my early 20s, I made the choice to study Chemistry and Biological Chemistry for my first degree. During that period, I ignored my own dreams of pursuing something in the arts, and wanted to focus on forensic science. I started watching a lot of television shows in which forensic techniques were used to solve crimes, including Bones. I was particularly drawn to this show because the main character, a forensic anthropologist named Temperance Brennan, was portrayed as someone who was tactless and hyper-rational. I grew up as quite an emotional and sensitive person, and she represented the type of person I wanted to be at the time, so somehow I started mimicking her mannerisms and personality. As I moved on from that phase of my life and began developing my art practice, I forgot about this obsession of mine. But during the lockdown period of the pandemic, I revisited Bones again. While I found myself questioning the accuracy of the various laboratory procedures, I still enjoyed the narrative arc the series had. I also saw something poetic and poignant in the way the autopsy scenes played out. I had never performed an autopsy during my earlier studies, so when the opportunity to ‘perform’ one in my artwork presented itself, I jumped on it. Q Curators Your works often have a strong narrative, and even performative element. Why is this framing important to you? A Moses Tan Perhaps because of my own background in theatre, I’ve always enjoyed storytelling. I recall that when I was teaching ‘A’ Level Chemistry as part of an internship at Millennia Institute, I developed storylines for students to help them remember various pieces of information. This was a tool I had used in my own studies to make it a lot more fun—when I was studying organic chemistry synthesis, I always made little comics as a means to recall the terms and actions. In my artwork, I find combining various tangents into an arc to be a good creative exercise, and I hope this arc becomes something audiences can bring away with them. <img width="2304" height="3456" width_o="2304" height_o="3456" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ce55419b07ced28a93ad024eea76d5e57cfbc57ca6c28084e5bd0370f4a0b69c/Moses-Tan.png" data-mid="129183944" border="0" data-no-zoom src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/ce55419b07ced28a93ad024eea76d5e57cfbc57ca6c28084e5bd0370f4a0b69c/Moses-Tan.png" /> BiographyMoses Tan (b. 1986, Singapore) is an artist whose work explores histories that intersect with queer theory and politics, while looking at melancholia and shame as points of departure. Working with drawing, video, and installation, his interest lies in the use of subtlety and codes in the articulation of narratives. He graduated from LASALLE College of the Arts with a BA (Hons) in Fine Arts, and also holds a BA (Hons) in Chemistry and Biological Chemistry from Nanyang Technological University. He has exhibited his works at Yavuz Gallery and Grey Projects in Singapore, and internationally at various spaces in Australia, Hong Kong, Germany, Turkey, and the United States. He currently programs and runs starch, an artist-run space in Singapore. Follow Website Instagram ︎︎︎ ︎︎︎