Articles Archives

Belasungkawa Rohani Yousoff: Pentas, Kelas dan Kertas

Oleh Shahrul Mizad Ashari dan Fasyali Fadzly (774 patah kata, 10 minit bacaan) Rohani Yousoff atau lebih senang dipanggil dengan Kak Ani bagi penggiat teater merupakan salah seorang tokoh teater terpenting negara. Sumbangannya tidak terhad dalam bidang teater praktik tetapi juga dalam bidang akademik. Beliau yang merupakan rakan seangkatan Ahmad Yatim, Faridah Merican, Rahim Razali […]

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Kochi: the City and its Biennale

Don’t all Biennales compete with the cities they are sited in? It’s certainly true of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale in Kerala, a state located on the south-western coast of India. Set largely in the increasingly gentrified Fort Kochi, the biennale also takes on the additional name of a first A.D. port identified in Greco-Roman and Tamil

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Cosmologizing Social Evil in Dulaang Up’s “Faust”

Dulaang UP’s current production, Rody Vera’s Filipino adaptation of Faust, directed by José Estrella, at once seeks to stay true to the spirit of and attempts to contemporize Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s famous Manichean drama that was resolutely rooted in the Romantic vision of its own time.

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Warming Up to Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s ‘Fever Room’

In many of Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s films, the membrane that separates dream from reality is a porous one. In Syndromes And A Century, snatches of dialogue are repeated, with slight variations, as if to recreate the sensation of déjà vu. In Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, a long lost son returns

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Podcast 11: Cloud Gate 2, “A Triple Bill”

Duration: 21 minutes Dance practitioners and educators Stephanie Burridge and Susan Sentler discuss Cloud Gate 2‘s A Triple Bill, including the interplay of music and choreography, references to Martha Graham’s aesthetics, and the many ways bodies can “carve the architecture of a space”. Cameo mentions of other dance groups and productions in this podcast review

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6 – 12 March 2017: Singapore

Family Secrets – A Date With Friends 2017 by The Necessary Stage, 10-12 Mar, Esplanade Theatre Studio The Necessary Stage’s Theatre for Seniors presents Family Secrets, a double bill of well-loved plays by Cultural Medallion winner Haresh Sharma, about two families encountering change through illness afflicting their senior members, and how they rise above the challenge

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Learning how the art world works with Sarah Thornton at Art Fair Philippines

Learning how the art world works with Sarah Thornton at Art Fair Philippines Read More »

The Phnom Penh Post Guide to the Cambodia International Film Festival

For the first time, this year’s edition will be held in the spring, where Eloy expects it to remain in coming years. The lineup is an intoxicating mix of local and regional films, with Western offerings sprinkled throughout, as well as a celebration of local music, arts and dance. Because of the range of films,

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6 – 12 March 2017: Indonesia

Top Picks in Jakarta and Bandung 6-12 March 2017 JAKARTA Of Horizon Landscape, 6 March 2017, 7 PM, Hall B – Gudang Sarinah Ekosistem, Jakarta Of Horizon Landscape is a performance art by artists involved in the 69 Performance Club, a study platform for performance art created by Forum Lenteng. A landscape can be

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Graffiti and Street Art Thrive In a Rundown Phnom Penh Neighborhood

Graffiti in Cambodia has not historically been very common, but that’s changing fast due to the city’s relatively young and increasingly urban and networked population. While many tags are done by people passing through or immigrants who live here, locals are discovering the joys and thrills of tagging as well. Nowhere can you see this more

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Dancers Gather

Singapore-based dancer-choreographer and scholar Stephanie Burridge is anxiously awaiting the proofs for her tenth book, but she’ll find time to fly into Canberra for a big dance summit.

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To Biennale or Not To Biennale (Part II)

This is the second of a two-part essay on origins and rise of biennales within the context of Malaysia’s aspirations for a world-class international visual art mega-exhibition. Read Part I here. Part II Increasing scholarly focus has been directed on the biennale trend over the past two decades, along with the rise in prominence of

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Review: Theatre Company shelf’s “GHOSTS-COMPOSITION/IBSEN”

‘The Cave’, a converted bar and restaurant that is the venue for the performance of Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts, is small. Audiences sit on three sides, around five persons abreast, ever mindful that to stretch their legs would be to trespass into the performance area. How does one perform Ghosts in such a space, with its

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27 Feb – 5 Mar 2017: Singapore

ExxonMobil Campus Concerts – Alfaaz, NUS University Cultural Centre, 1 March, 8pm Alfaaz (n.): Urdu for spoken word; the distinguishing factor that makes us undeniably human. Words shape us, unite us and yet at the same time, divide us. Much like humanity, language constantly evolves. The complexity and sense of poetry of years past have

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Yokohama’s Creative City: Interview with Kozue Nakayama

By Kathy Rowland (1484 words, 15-minute read) The Tokyo Performing Arts Market (TPAM) was established in 1995. In 2011, TPAM moved to the City of Yokohama, re-branding as the Performing Arts Meeting in Yokohama. The shift of location also signalled a realignment, from showcase to co-presenting, with a specific focus on Asia. Over the past

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To Biennale or Not To Biennale (Part I)

This is the first of a two-part essay on origins and rise of biennales within the context of Malaysia’s aspirations for a world-class international visual art mega-exhibition. Read Part II here. Part I News that Kuala Lumpur will stage its first biennale in November this year have been circulating amongst Malaysian art insiders since 2015.

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Empire Strikes Back: “Artist and Empire: (En)countering Colonial Legacies”

By Akanksha Raja (1500 words, 15-minute read) There is a distinctive break made between the modern, sans-serif typeface of the word “Artist” and the classical serif typeface of the word “Empire” in the title/publicity material of the National Gallery Singapore’s reinterpretation of the 2015 Tate Modern’s exhibition “Artist and Empire”. The typographical split signifies a

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The Case for Political Art in a Post-Truth Age

In a heated political climate, art turns radical in order to address the struggles of a society always at the cusp of a social upheaval. Art Fair Philippines 2017 highlights the work of social realists, inviting audiences to reevaluate the role of art in their daily lives. Tags: Art Fair Philippines CNN Philippines Political Art Politics

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Manila’s Poklong Anading: Chaos, Junk and Art

Poklong Anading is a 41-year-old Filipino artist with an unruly mop of hair and an extremely diffident manner. Featured in the “No Chaos, No Party: 28 Artists in Metro Manila” book (a project by Valeria Cavestany edited by Eva McGovern-Basa) and also participating in the ongoing 2017 Art Fair Philippines, Poklong has emerged as one the

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20 – 26 February 2017: Singapore

Indices of Vanishment by RAW Moves, 23 – 25 Feb, 8pm, Aliwal Arts Centre Choreographed by Edith Podesta, Lighting Design by Adrian Tan, Sound Design by Teo Wee Boon and performed by RAW Moves Company Dancers, Indices of Vanishment is the 2017 edition of RAW Moves’ annual Repertory Platform. Indices of Vanishment is a movement performance that examines

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20 – 26 February 2017: Indonesia

Top Picks in Jakarta, Yogyakarta, and Bali 20-26 February 2017 JAKARTA E-MOTIONS 2017, 26 February 2017, 2 & 7 PM, Teater Besar, Taman Ismail Marzuki, Jakarta Gigi Art of Dance has risen in the last few years to become Jakarta’s beloved home for dance. This year, Gigi Art of Dance returns with their annual

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13 – 19 February 2017: Singapore

ExxonMobil Campus Conerts – Discovery: Stephycube, 16 Feb, 6pm, NUS Yusof Ishak House Singer-songwriter Steph likes to strum late into the night in the privacy of her room, where she mixes popular radio songs. Although her online repertoire consists mainly of acoustic tracks, her musical influences are mainly pop rock while her lyrics are inspired

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Zoned Out at the Singapore Biennale 2016

Institution ° Preparations are ongoing. An assistant paints the white wall a bit whiter. Spelling mistakes in the text on the wall are corrected. The white cube divided into nine zones is ready for visitors. Everything looks smooth and polished: the space, the artworks, and the people. ¶ In Singapore the concept of being “gardened”

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Tash Aw & Tahmima Anam Discuss Home, Identity and the Changing Face of Asia

I think if anyone is truly honest about any meaningful relationship, they will experience a certain ambiguity about it: no one can love totally without questioning that relationship from time to time, and if they did, it wouldn’t be real. It’s the same with relationships with your country: the deeper your attachment, the more you

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13 – 19 February 2017: Indonesia

Top Picks in Jakarta, Bali and Yogyakarta from 13 – 19 February JAKARTA Cinconotas – Salihara Jazz Buzz 2017, 19 Feb 2017, 08:00 PM, Black Box Theatre Treat yourself this Sunday with a performance by the a capella jazz group, Cinconotas. The group’s artistic director, Arif Dharma, has performed on Java Jazz Festival, along

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Someone to say ‘stop it, this is too much’: Raka Maitra and T Sasitharan on collaboration

Dancer-choreographer Raka Maitra, 46, and dramaturg T. Sasitharan, 59, have been constant collaborators. He is the director of the Intercultural Theatre Institute (ITI), while she is the founder of 10-year-old dance company Chowk, known for its contemporary expressions of the traditional Indian dance form of Odissi. When asked, the two recall a disagreement with some mirth, like

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Your underwear is showing: Foreign Bodies

By Kathy Rowland (1030 words, 15 minute read) Skin in SIN, a new burlesque group, made its debut at the M1 Singapore Fringe Festival (M1SFF) last month. Members of the group had spent several months learning the art of burlesque whilst developing their stage persona and performance, under the mentorship and training of Singaporean drag

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Public Art in Ho Chi Minh City

As a communist country, Vietnam isn’t always the easiest place to find publicly displayed art, especially modern or controversial work. However, the country seems to be changing – and Ho Chi Minh City is leading the way. Here are some of the best places to see public art in the city. Tags: Spaces The Culture Trip

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‘Menatap Sang Liyan’: Orientalism in the history of dance

Curator Helly Minarti opens her exhibition “Menatap Sang Liyan (Looking at the Other)” at Salihara in Jakarta. The exhibition’s title, “Menatap Sang Liyan”, was selected to represent how Western people looked at the four Javanese dancers, whom they called “the other” (liyan). The exhibition also displays the complexity of orientalism in the art of dance by showing various

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Winner, Singapore Biennale 2016 Essay Writing Competition: To-Do List for the End of the World

Congratulations to Marcus Yee for winning AICA + ArtsEquator’s Inaugural Best Essay on the Singapore Biennale 2016 by an Emerging Art Writer Competition with this essay. By Marcus Yee, (3040 words, 30-minute read) “A map of the world that does not include utopia is not worth glancing at.” — Oscar Wilde [1] 1. Find escape

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