Was a Skeptic, Still a Skeptic: A Festival-Goer’s Impressions of SIFA 2018
By Ke Weiliang (2,470 words, 10-minute read) In March 2017, Gaurav Kripalani was officially unveiled as the Festival Director for Singapore International Festival of Arts (SIFA) 2018 – 2020. I was over the moon, but only because a rare opportunity…
“Anticipation of One”: Futuristic Rituals of Sight and Sound
By Pow Jun Kai (588 words, 5-minute read) The artistic intention to merge histories and futures is almost always poised as a double-edged sword. One mounts the impossible task of adhering to an imaginary time that is not re-presentable; the…
“A Dream Under the Southern Bough – The Beginning”: Kun Opera for the Millennial Stage
By Jocelyn Chng (813 words, 5-minute read) A Festival Commission for the Singapore International Festival of Arts (SIFA) 2018, Toy Factory’s A Dream Under the Southern Bough – The Beginning is, as the title suggests, the first part of a…
“OCD Love” by L-E-V Dance Company: Mental Illness Plus Dance Equals Ballet and Horror
By Chan Sze-Wei (849 words, 5 minute read) L-E-V Dance company’s OCD Love is tightly choreographed and intense in its physicality, as might be expected from a choreographer issuing from years dancing, choreographing and directing for the iconic Batsheva Company…
Mayfly Docus: “Die Tomorrow” and “14 Apples” at SIFA’s “Singular Screens”
By Dan Koh (1,715 words, 15-minute read) At this year’s Singapore International Festival of Arts (SIFA), the two films from Southeast Asia are documentaries, or hybrid-documentaries—just like last year’s three, curiously. Despite the glaring gaps that remain in the funding,…
Same same but different: ASEAN 50 at the Singapore Writers Festival 2017
By Akanksha Raja (840 words, 8-minute read) “Language is born from imagination, and imagination is what makes language real. Without language, we have no memory: therefore, literacy (the mastery of language) is important. Our sense of language is the most…
Pathey Nimidam 2017: A Tamil Theatre Festival
By Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai (1900 words, 12-minute read) Pathey Nimidam 2017 opens up to a simple bare-bones theatre, plunged in darkness with a few blocks embellished with light, waiting for creativity and spark to bring them alive. From here stemmed…
Sonic Multiplicity: Reflections on “Sounds of Singapore”
By Pavithra Raja (1695 words, 20-minute read) What are the sounds of Singapore? It’s hard to pin down, given that Singapore is the site of a number of different musical influences, many of them rooted in the different ethnic communities…