The Commission: Why do these three meet again?
By Eugene Tan (1,503 words, 5-minute read) As has become customary for every review of a Singapore International Festival of the Arts (SIFA) 2021 show (or as the festival programme now calls them, “content”), we should applaud the fact that…
AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency: Meet the Writers (Part 2)
We recently announced our selected resident writers for the inaugural AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency, focusing on the development and promotion of critical writing about arts and culture in Southeast Asia. They are: Nhuan Dong from Saigon; Dwiki Aprinaldi…
AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency: Meet the Writers (Part 1)
We recently announced our selected resident writers for the inaugural AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency, focusing on the development and promotion of critical writing about arts and culture in Southeast Asia. They are: Nhuan Dong from Saigon; Dwiki Aprinaldi from…
Open Call for AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency 2021/2022
ArtsEquator and Goethe-Institut Singapore are pleased to announce the launch of the inaugural AE x Goethe-Institut Critical Writing Micro-Residency 2021/2022. This is a digital micro-residency focusing on the development and promotion of critical writing about arts and culture in Southeast…
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…
The Artist-Curator’s Eye: Manit Sriwanichpoom’s “Rediscovering Forgotten Thai Masters of Photography”
By Elaine Chiew (1,600 words, eight-minute read) Art historian Patrick Flores first addressed the phenomenon of the artist-curator in his seminal essay Turns in Tropics [1] as someone who holds a certain power and who has become a key figure…
The Artists’ Colony: A Review of OH! Emerald Hill
By Ng Yi-Sheng (1,585 words, eight-minute read) In the assembly hall of Chatsworth International School hang six statues of Sir Stamford Raffles. However, these aren’t your typical heroic effigies of Singapore’s chief colonist. They’re headless, legless, composed of patchwork fabric…
Pangdemonium’s “The Father”: Dementia Becomes Us
By Akanksha Raja (780 words, five-minute read) Pangdemonium’s first play of 2018, The Father, revolves around the 70-year-old titular character, André (Lim Kay Siu), and the harrowing effects of his increasingly uncontrollable symptoms of dementia on daughter Anne (Tan Kheng…
“Kumar50”: More significant than SG53
By Eugene Tan (1,475 words, eight-minute read) Marking Kumar’s 50th year alive, and the start of Dream Academy’s 2018 season at the Capitol Theatre, Kumar50 is a celebration, a retelling of history, but most of all, a show meant to…
“Talk to me and I slap you”: confronting intimacy and violence
By Chloe Chotrani (1,040 words, five-minute read) The one who loves you hits you. The one who hits you loves you. The one who loves you hurts you. This is a piece about relationships, unfortunately. (We can’t get away from…
From the lucid dream of “Cut Kafka!”, a promising new artistic path
By Bernice Lee (995 words, four-minute read) The Esplanade Theatre Studio is awash in red light. It feels like the set of a Marvel movie – gloomy and dystopian; a planet overtaken by villains, awaiting rescue. Red mechanical legs hang…
Life isn’t a beach in “Einstein in the Carpark”
By Corrie Tan (1,300 words, eight-minute read) This review has been translated into Mandarin by Liu Xiaoyi, artistic director of Emergency Stairs. Read his translation here. If the avant garde director Robert Wilson died and went to purgatory, Einstein in the Carpark…
Lui Hock Seng: The Past and Passing
By Akanksha Raja (920 words, four-minute read) On the heels of Objectifs Centre’s January showcase “we will have been young”, a group exhibition of works by fledgling Southeast Asian photographers themed on contemporary youth culture and the future, comes a…
“Be Longing” moves between home and away
By Germaine Cheng (740 words, four-minute read) There is an unspeakable tranquil that washes over the audience seated inside the chapel at Objectifs – Centre for Photography and Film in Singapore. For the first five minutes of Be Longing by Sara Tan and…
“Adukku Veetu Annasamy 3”: a rip-roaring trilogy comes to a close
By Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai (1,150 words, 8-minute read) The final instalment in Ravindran Drama Group’s trilogy, Adukku Veetu Annasamy 3, picks up right after the lovers Rajendran (Annasamy and Kokilavani’s son) and Prema (Panchatcharam and Gunasundari’s daughter) have parted ways. Their incessantly…
“Displaced” by Ground Cover Theatre at the Singapore Fringe: A Roundtable
The following roundtable discussion was held as part of the Lyn Gardner Theatre Reviewing Training Programme. Particpants Teo Dawn, Ezekiel Oliveira, Isaac Lim, Patricia Tobin, and Richard Chung discussed Displaced by Ground Cover Theatre, staged at the M1 Singapore Fringe Festival 2018….
“Platform Series: Journeys”: Of Skin and Sole
By Naeem Kapadia (885 words, 5-minute read) It’s an exciting time for the emerging playwright in Singapore. Workshops, residencies and other artistic opportunities abound to develop and showcase fresh work, often in collaboration with theatre companies. These include platforms such…
“Cinta Tuah Jebat”: Love on the Rocks
By Corrie Tan (1228 words, 10-minute read) A man is rising from the water. The sea is birthing him: his closely-cropped hair, his bare chest and shoulders, his damp sarong clinging to his thighs. On land, another man with a…
“Forked” by Jo Tan: An Uneven Production
By Wong Wen Pu (600 words, 4-minute read) Forked by Jo Tan follows the experiences of one Jeanette Peh (played by Ethel Yap), a Singaporean student, as she heads to London to study acting, against the vehement objections of her…
“Forked” by Jo Tan: Shapeshifting Identities
By Bernice Lee (722 words, 5-minute read) Jo Tan’s first full-length play Forked hits plenty of right notes. High energy, uncomfortably honest and deliberately racist, it’s funny because it’s true. In spite of its great momentum however, the play’s pace…
“Forked”: Privilege Gets Served
By Richard Chung (738 words, 7 minute read) Jo Tan’s playwriting debut offers a simple yet familiar story of one Singaporean girl with big dreams. In Forked, Ethel Yap plays Jeanette, a young aspiring actor who heads to London for…
“Forked”: An Asian Crisis
By Isaac Lim (676 words, 6-minute read) Jeanette Peh promotes herself as a ‘star’, with ‘over 500 followers’ on her ‘Stage Whispers’ YouTube channel which promises straight-up, no-holds-barred confessions. Is that the reality, or is she just a wannabe? Jo…
A Reaction Video to Jo Tan’s “Forked”
By Teo Dawn (736 words, 7 minute read) (Transcript for SunSh!neGurrl*94’s YouTube video – A Reaction Video to Forked by Jo Tan) Hello everybody, ni hao and welcome back to my channel. I have been reading your comments and you…
“Forked”: Jeanette doesn’t do Asian
By Ezekiel Oliveira (546 words, 4-minute read) Jeanette Peh is determined to become an actor, but she already thinks she is something of a star on her YouTube channel ‘Stage Whispers’ which has 500 subscribers. She turns down a place…
Get “Forked”: Finding our Racial Identity
By Patricia Tobin (800 words, 6-minute read) When I was 19, I left Singapore to pursue my studies in Melbourne. I foolishly thought that any city, anywhere else in the world, would be better than this tiny island. In Melbourne,…
Looking within with “Attempts: Singapore”
Spoiler Alert: If you’re planning to experience the mystery and suspense of Attempts: Singapore, read only after you’ve attended the performance. By Patricia Tobin (788 words, 6-min read) “She is a terrorist, she is a cultist, she works for sex.” “Who…
“Attempts: Singapore”: Is the Anne nigh?
Spoiler Alert: If you’re planning to experience the mystery and suspense of Attempts: Singapore, read only after you’ve attended the performance. By Isaac Lim (508 words, 4 minute read) 1957hrs: I arrive at the lobby of Centre 42, which has been…
“Attempts: Singapore”: Game On
Spoiler Alert: If you’re planning to experience the mystery and suspense of Attempts: Singapore, read only after you’ve attended the performance. By Richard Chung In a world of innovative theatrical experiences, you often come across too many that scrimp on either…
“Attempts: Singapore”: The Curtains Don’t Match the Drapes
Spoiler Alert: If you’re planning to experience the mystery and suspense of Attempts: Singapore, read only after you’ve attended the performance. By Ezekiel Oliveira (589 words, 5-minute read) Humanity may be under threat, the end of the world might well be…
“Attempts: Singapore”: Let The Games Begin
Spoiler Alert: If you’re planning to experience the mystery and suspense of Attempts: Singapore, read only after you’ve attended the performance. By Teo Dawn (650 words, 5-minute read) Attempts: Singapore by Rei Poh is a participatory piece of theatre inspired by…