Dialogues with Mountains: Preserving indigenous culture in Taromak and Kelecung
By Wennie Yang (1,400 words, 6-minute read) Let’s face it. Leisure travel feels like a distant memory at the moment. I’ve been trying to envision what a collective future means for destination hotspots in Southeast Asia, whose economies used to…
ArtsEquator, Deadline Now
by Kathy Rowland ArtsEquator sometimes feels like a mythical creature. Looking back over the past 4 years, it takes the shape of a unicorn, a joyful improbability. With Covid-19, it can weigh like an albatross, cash flow statements instead of…
Burning Questions: Traditional Arts: The Forgotten COVID Casualty?
While the pandemic has resulted in losses of jobs in the arts, less has been said about the fate of craftsmen, artisans and masters of intangible heritage and traditional arts. Artists Khin Maung Htwe (Myanmar), Alena Murang (Malaysia) and Jacob…
Burning Questions: Tech in Performance: The Great Leveller or The Great Unequaliser?
Using technology in performance isn’t new, but COVID-19 has forced more artists to explore the digital medium, dealing with lag, latency and liveness while rethinking audience engagement and accessibility. Are we witnessing a new renaissance in the performing arts or…
Podcast 79: Asia TOPA (Part 2)
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by In this latest podcast episode, Nabilah Said and Carolyn Oei discuss various productions that were recently presented at Melbourne’s Asia TOPA: Are You Ready To Take The…
Podcast 78: Asia TOPA (Part 1)
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by In this latest podcast episode, Nabilah Said and Carolyn Oei discuss various productions that were recently presented at Melbourne’s Asia TOPA: Black Ties | HuRu-hARa | Chinese Square Dancers…
À Ố Làng Phố: Less trick, more treat in Vietnamese bamboo circus
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Nabilah Said (730 words, 6-minute read) You go into a circus performance with certain expectations. You want the big shebang, the SPECTACULAR SPECTACULAR. The physical feats…
Dragon Ladies Don’t Weep: Brilliance Is Margaret Leng Tan
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Carolyn Oei (638 words, 5-minute read) Note: This review may contain some minor spoilers for Dragon Ladies Don’t Weep by Margaret Leng Tan. ONE: “Music;…
Hades Fading: Modern-day Ancients
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Nabilah Said (708 words, 5-minute read) In Hades Fading, Eurydice has a memory problem. She can’t remember where she comes from. The books all tell her…
Are You Ready To Take The Law Into Your Own Hands: Tongue Scrapes Against Cheek
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Nabilah Said (670 words, 5-minute read) I watched Are You Ready To Take The Law Into Your Own Hands by Sipat Lawin and Friends on 26…
Metal: An Improbable Alchemy of Dance And Heavy Metal
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Carolyn Oei (762 words, 5-minute read) I am not a fan of heavy metal music – or heavy metal anything – so I took my seat…
Torch the Place: Shedding the Dead Weight
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Nabilah Said (800 words, 5-minute read) The first thing one sees upon entering the Fairfax Studio in Arts Centre Melbourne for Torch the Place is a…
The Seen and Unseen: A Search For Self
The following review is made possible through a Critical Residency programme supported by By Carolyn Oei (638 words, 4-minute read) “Embracing life means embracing every element of dualism in it. Embracing the good and the bad, the happy and the…
Tangled and tackled: Black Ties at Sydney Festival 2020
By Maria Herminia Graterol Garrido (550 words, 4-minute read) The challenges of fusing and representing more than one culture while planning and executing a memorable wedding are well-known to us in real life and in fiction. Movies like My Big…
A sound collaboration: 宿 (stay) at Sydney Festival 2020
By Maria Herminia Graterol Garrido (571 words, 4-minute read) There is a huge difference between watching a great piece of theatre with a beautiful original score, and experiencing a process that gives equal importance to all the creative aspects, including…
La Cie Maxmind’s “Isle of Dreams”: The Dark Fantastic
By Akanksha Raja (620 words, four-minute read) 拾念劇集 La Cie Maxmind’s Isle of Dreams (蓬萊) was the headlining event for the George Town Festival’s Taiwan-focused showcase this year. It is a three-hour long work of musical theatre, original in story…
The Art and Consequence of Collaboration: Interview with Vicki Sowry and Jonathan Parsons
Presented by the National Arts Council Singapore, The Art and Consequence of Collaboration with the Australian Network for Art & Technology (ANAT) and Experimenta is a series of presentations that give an insight into the art/technology and art/science sectors in Australia,…
Is Singapore losing its standing as the art hub of Southeast Asia? (via SEA Globe)
Despite the government’s desperate attempts to position Singapore as Southeast Asia’s arts hub, flagging figures at major shows and accusations of artificiality have put the city-state’s art scene under more scrutiny than ever Singapore has long tried to combat its…
Book Review: “Dance, Access and Inclusion: Perspectives on Dance, Young People and Change”
By Joseph Gonzales (857 words, five-minute read) This is the book to own or read if you are in any way invested, connected and working with children as well as people with special needs. It is exactly as the title…
The Facetious Gender Politics of Go Lim, Hanoi’s Feminist Post-Punk Quintet (via Saigoneer)
In an example of cruel irony, October 20 is when we celebrate annual Vietnam Women’s Day, and also the anniversary of the passing of Mai Nga (commonly known as Nga Nhi), the lead singer of Go Lim – a Hanoi-based…
The importance of documenting & archiving the performing arts (via ASEF Culture360)
Chloe Chotrani is a movement artist and writer based in Singapore. She has set up the performing arts archive, Talking Circles, a digital archive of performing artists from South, Southeast Asia and its Diaspora. A continuous work in progress, the archive stands as…
In Conversation with Contemporary Art’s Street Miner (via The Artling)
‘Street Mining: Contemporary Art from the Philippines’ features the works of Poklong Anading, Louie Cordero, Victor Balanon, Nona Garcia, Kawayan de Guia, Mm Yu, and the collective ‘Broke’. The show runs at Sundaram Tagore Gallery from 20 January to 2…
Dance as Devotion in South India and Southeast Asia
By Chloe Chotrani (1400 words, 12-minute read) Dance was practiced as a devotional union between the ancestral and earthly realms through ritualistic performances in architectural spaces, with its genesis in India, extending into Southeast Asia. This essay examines the bronze…
Singapore art scene losing ground to Hong Kong and Southeast Asia (via South China Morning Post)
Lorenzo Rudolf seems to be taking the adage “all publicity is good publicity” a bit too far. Speaking on the opening day of Art Stage Singapore, the president and founder of the annual contemporary art fair gave such a downbeat…
An Artist’s Guide to Not Being Complicit with Gentrification (via Hyperallergic)
We are in a moment where the connection between art, real estate, and the displacement of longtime residents is undeniable. How might artists take responsibility for how we alter people’s lives, in terms of the impacts of real estate speculation…
Southeast Asia Stakes Its Claim in the Art World (via the New York Times)
“Until recently — the 1990s, let’s say — an American critic keeping tabs on new art would concentrate on New York’s museums and galleries; cast an occasional, often dismissive eye on Western Europe; and perhaps try to visit Los Angeles…
Ninagawa’s “Macbeth”: Just Not Shakespeare’s
By Isaac Lim (516 words, 5-minute read) A supersized Butsudan (Buddhist altar) frames the stage, flanked by two old peasants who open the panels to indicate the commencement of a ritual. Within is 16th century post-civil war Japan, replete with…
Book Review: “Photography in Southeast Asia: A Survey” by Zhuang Wubin
By Marina Zuccarelli (550 words, 5-minute read) Photography arrived in Southeast Asia soon after its discovery in Europe in 1839, provoking contrasting reactions and developing in different ways according to the environment where it was introduced, yet having indeed an…
“Khwaab-Sa”: Shakespeare with masala and magic
By Naeem Kapadia (800 words, 6-minute read) Atul Kumar is no stranger to Shakespeare. The artistic director of Mumbai-based group The Company Theatre was first seen here in 2009 in the title role of Hamlet: The Clown Prince, which featured…
Tikam-Tikam Japan: Table and Chairs
By Leow Puay Tin (1350 words, 10-minute read) Recently I caught a round of theatrical experimentations by Southeast Asian and Japanese directors in Tokyo. Called One Table Two Chairs Meeting 2017, it was the second of a 3-year series at…