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POLARIS ARTISTS TALKS

430 light years away from the planet Earth, a star, the brightest of its kind, burns in the skies

above the north pole. This star is Polaris - commonly know as Northern Star or Pole Star.

Like the brightest star in the oceanic sky, the theme for Republic Polytechnic's annual visual

art programme (under the umbrella of REFLECTIONS’ 2009 – Republic Polytechnic’s Community

Arts Festival from 29th October to 30th January 09) suggest a confluence of ideas and multiple

exchanges of Media, Art and technology.

POLARIS. Art, New Media & Technology addresses these variant forms, positions,

influences, messages and the pleasure of viewing Art, by presenting the plethora of use and tehe

value of Art framed by ideas and practices in new media and technology.

To reach out to art communities, Republic Polytechnic's The Republic Cultural Centre

(TRCC) & Singapore Contemporary Young Artists (SCYA) organised a series of Young Artists

Talks focusing on issues related to the process of Art-making, ideas and presentation of the Artist's

intention through their chosen medium.

These talks, conducted by a diverse range of young & bright artists, provide an inside

perspective to the artist’s concepts when creating an artwork.

Aiman Hakim, a painter, started the series on the 29 th of October in a quiet Art Studio at The

Republic Cultural Centre with a mix of students and members of the public listening attentively to

his presentation and after, presented a short video clip of the Young Artist's sketches before a

major solo show. Aiman shared his views on his decision to become an Artist after enrolling himself

in an Art School and also later tried a job employment with Singapore Airlines. In his paintings,

Aiman suggest a link to the relationship between his personal experience and the craft of painting

with an interest of comic book collecting. He conveys that Art can be shared and experienced so

long as one is willing to explore into his or herself.


Aiman Hakim, artwork from “For ages 4 and up', Oil on Canvas

Aiman Hakim, artwork from “For ages 4 and up', Oil on Canvas
Hazel Lim's art has an interactive element in her approach. She looks at fusing memories,

colours, perception and ideas like a chemist working in the laboratory to form new meanings & new

objects. She encourages participation in her art-making process by having audiences pick certain

words to form new words with new meanings. Hazel then constructs their artworks into tiny little

palm size books which are then shelved into a periodic table, as though commenting on an

invention waiting to take place.

Hazel Lim, 'the e le men tal in ter ludes', installation

Billy Soh, Maxine Chionh and Lim Shengen presented Photography in a much different

light.

Billy introduced to the audience, a thematic system of looking at photography with classical

music by studying the musical overlays, subject and composition matter. He approaches

photography as though composing a piece of music. Therefore the audience's perception

boundaries of photography were expanded.

Maxine on the other hand, shared a playful way of exploring the print of the photography by
erasing or making a physical mark on the paper itself. Her work suggests a deconstruction of the

attitude towards making a photograph.

Shengen shared his interest in photograph as social practice with his works from his solo

show 'Being Lost, Being Found.' From his landscape images of places he had travelled to hidden

portraiture of Singaporeans, Shengen comments on the increasingly lack of personal space in

urban societies.

Lim Shengen, artwork from 'Being Lost, Being Found', Photography

Another artist who uses photography in her work is Sha Najak. Sha incorporates the

studies of human psychology into her artwork by channelling an intuitive, natural process of

expressing human emotion, having her audiences make the artworks for themselves which she
later documents and makes observation notes and points accompanying.

A young ceramicist, Jacqui Rae had the audiences on the edge of their seats for her works

intrigue ideas pertaining to process and outcome. She provided an insight into questioning

materials, objectives and ideas of sculpture to the notion that there is no such thing as a mistake,

only an extension of learning and exploration. Jacqui's sculptural works tend to be presented in a

grey area of tangibility and impermanence. Completely fascinated with the emptiness of space and

with stretching the properties of ceramics, she links these two subjects and creates beautiful

installation pieces of ceramic works which sometimes are not able to last longer than a few days

after a show's opening.

Susan Olij also takes on the form on material intangibility in her ink paintings and

observations of cultures and philosophies through self-contemplation in her visual language. In her

talk, Susan also attempted to answer questions about the role and potential of artists in the world

today when it comes to a profession that poses many unknowns and unpredictability. How does

one navigate in the art world, with it's highly unregulated economy.

Jacqui Rae, 'The Contention of a Memory', Clay


Susan Olij, 'Transmap Graph 01', Chinese ink on rice paper
Performance Art is another intangible art form. It is not readily consumable or hold certain

dollar value in the Art Market but it is a form of art that has been used actively by many artists in

the world. Performance Art express human interaction and communication.

In the Artist Talk, Natasha Sophia Wei shares her work as a Performance Artist challenging

different social interactions, spaces, time and cultures. Simply a presentation of her work has to go

beyond talking, to reacting and perhaps conducting a performance during the session because

Performance Art is about the moment of activity.


Natasha Sophia Wei,

Ending off the month long programme in November is a film screening of Shopping and

Consumerism; The Story of Stuff by the folks from UnderneathTheRadar, a collective interested in

sharing and educating cause and effects of globalisation and the progress of humankind in the 21 st

Century through documentaries and films. Their collection of screenings accompanying a

discussion on society's needs, wants, behaviours and choices questions the role of ownership,

responsibilities and decisions in creating an environment for the preservation of our home and

land. It is in this contemporary time that it is even more so for Art & social realities to come

together, reaching out to communities to engage creativity, expressively, for a culturally sensitive,

responsible society.

~ Jacklyn Soo

Curator, SCYA
To visit TRCC: http://trcc.rp.sg/

To visit SCYA: www.contemporaryart.sg & www.scyaproject.wordpress.com

To visit UTR: www.underneatheradar.net

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