Name: Albert Lim
Thesis Title: Reimaging “Malayness” through the artworks of Fyerool Darma
Thesis Abstract:
Having graduated in 2012 from LASALLE College of the Arts with a Bachelor of Arts (Honours), Fyerool Darma began experimenting with a “self-absorbed” body of work entitled, “The Muted”. It was a series of paintings of oppressed peoples. However, dissatisfied with the paintings because of the absence of social narratives, he decided to burn almost all of his paintings and start afresh. This was to him an act of erasing and altering his own history, a process of “unravelling the mess and curiosities that float in his mind.”

Darma’s father and grandfather are both of Javanese heritage. The oral tradition of story-telling is embedded in his family, thus igniting a keen interest in Darma to conduct scholarly and investigative research into his family tradition, as well as his own identity. The “Millennial Malays” (those born between 1982 and 2004) demonstrate a rising dissatisfaction with the established order. Out of strong curiosity, Darma embarked on a journey to establish a new narrative and to reimagine his past culture. Casual conversations with family members and friends further fuelled his interest in locating his culture and to discover the possibilities and probabilities of oral histories.

The stereotyping of his people as “lazy natives” has had an emotional impact on Darma who rarely verbalized his feelings but allowed his voice to speak through his artworks. To Darma, the concepts, categorization and classification of the Melayu or Malay were problematic and he attempted to distance himself from such notions. According to him, such classification tend to place certain people in a box and opens up the “habit of comparison.”

In Darma’s work, there is a constant battle to re-shape his own world views, characterised by a refusal to be coloured by misconceptions of his own Islamic faith and colonial power struggles that led to discrimination against the native Malays. In the process of searching for his selfhood in this “cosmic world”, Darma had to constantly navigate intersections between the arts, culture, identity, history and myth to reach a philosophical understanding within this complex maze.

This thesis will examine the historical reimaginings in Darma’s art practice as a result of his extensive archival research and how these are manifested as alternative histories through his artworks. In some way, Darma was “curating” his own exhibition, one that will be markedly different from the narratives of the colonial past.

Name: Anna Koshcheeva
Thesis Title: Art of Post-socialist Laos. Contesting the Motherland, her Past and Future
Thesis Abstract:
Since post-socialism (ca. 1991), official art in Lao PDR has imagined the nation through its past and tradition. In the past decade, parallel contemporary practices have appeared in Laos, dealing with urgent social issues of today. This thesis examines the evolution of these two parallel art practices in Laos, as sites of contestation of the image of the motherland, her past and future.

The introduction of modern art to Laos coincided with the rise of the nationalist movements amongst Lao elites from the 1930s. From its inception, modern Lao art became preoccupied with imagining the motherland, and adopted neo-traditional tropes. To unpack implicit and symbolic meanings in neo-traditionalism, an iconographic analysis is used in this thesis. The iconography of tradition in Laos is anchored in the centres of its visual production: ban (“village”: representing the rural folk population) – vat (“temple”: representing Theravada Buddhist spirituality) – court (representing royal and high culture) – ritual (representing cyclical notions of time, national memory and social hierarchy) – ethnicities (representing minorities and hill tribe peoples). By including or omitting these symbols in the conception of the nation, its subjectivity can be manipulated. Choices of iconography can be ideologically informed.

This thesis argues that in the 1990s, neo-traditional art convened the iconography of ban-ritual-ethnicity to present the nation as a timeless, festive multiethnic village. This image promoted the idea of the resilience of Lao culture and soothed the anxieties of transitioning to post-socialism. This image was also successful in fostering new political alignments at cultural diplomacy events, upon the fall of the Second World.

Neo-traditional art of late post-socialism in today’s Laos has a different connotations. Through the dominant iconography of female-vista-ethnicity it renders the mother-land as gendered, objectified, passive and ahistorical. The legitimization of power in Laos is narrated through the nation’s dependence on the past and its need for cultural protection by masculine rule. References to court or vat remain taboo in official art.

The late post-socialist neo-traditional idea of the nation gazing backwards in time and denied of agency is resisted by the parallel contemporary practices. These artworks destabilize the monopoly of the official iconography, and act as sites of critical thinking on Lao conditions today and tomorrow.

Name: Chua Yi Wen
Thesis Title: To Come A Full Circle: Liu Kuo-sung’s Space Series (1969-1973)
Thesis Abstract:
Inspired by images from America’s Apollo space missions, Liu Kuo-sung (刘国松) (b. 1932) created a series of modern ink paintings depicting cosmic landscapes which he named Space Series (tai kong xi lie 太空系列) (1969-present). Since the creation of the first work in 1969, Liu devoted himself solely to this series for the next four years, producing more than three hundred works between 1969 and 1973. Liu shifted his focus away from the Space Series in 1973. China’s Shenzhou (神舟) space missions inspired him to revive the series in 2005, leading to the second phase of the Space Series which continues till today.

Across the numerous works, regardless of the size, colour, orientation and composition, there is only one constant – the circle motif. This paper examines the symbolic meaning of the circle in the Space Series, focusing on works created during the first period from 1969 to 1973. The works feature a hard-edged circular disc as the dominant pictorial motif and demonstrate a shift to clean-cut contours which are the antithesis of the soft calligraphic brushstrokes of Liu’s earlier ink paintings in the early 1960s.

The Space Series is the culmination of Liu’s efforts to amalgamate Western modern styles and techniques with the long tradition of Chinese ink to create a new artistic expression. The use of the circle (representing the Earth, the Moon or the Sun) as the main element in the composition pushes new boundaries in ink traditions. By introducing the circle, Liu expanded the degrees of expression for Chinese ink beyond a combination of dots and lines to include textural and surface tension effects.

The discussion of the circle is a starting point to critically examine the Space Series as a whole and evaluate its significance in Liu’s practice. This investigation into a little researched body of works, particularly the analysis of the connections between Liu’s theories and the development of his techniques and style, extends the discourse on modern ink painting.

Name: Elaine Teo
Thesis Title: Occupying the Spaces In-between: The Force of Geography on Singapore’s Contemporary Art, and the Embodiment of the Marginal “Other”
Thesis Abstract:
“The Singapore Story” weaves history into a narrative with moral takeaways for the country’s entire citizenry. Ideas of vulnerability, meritocracy, and constant economic progress are held up key defining traits of the nation-state. Of the three, vulnerability is the underlying force driving all else. The economic imperatives of the state post-independence meant that what was marketed as fundamental to Singaporean identity played upon Orientalist fantasies. In particular, the late 1960s to early 1970s saw the adoption of a curious set of icons: The Singapore Girl, the Merlion, and the white-polymarble replica statue of Raffles. This trinity sealed Singapore, and her people into a time capsule of sorts, allowing it to play its hand as a (formerly) colonised state to lure foreign capital.

Contemporary artists in Singapore have had to reckon with a notion of identity that is strongly rooted in this binary. The totalizing narrative of the nation-state has made the discourse addressing tensions beneath Singapore’s assumed global role, relatively moot in the country. However, as contemporary artists in Singapore travel overseas, they assume this role of the marginal ‘Other’, many of them portraying “otherness” to its very hilt. These works have come to gain prominence either in Singapore’s art historical canon, or in numerous exhibitions. This thesis examines three specific series of artworks by a trio of contemporary artists from Singapore. These are Yellow Man (Lee Wen), Singirl (Amanda Heng), and Shawna (Sean Lee). The study considers these works within the disciplinary force of geography, as outlined in Irit Rogoff’s Terra Infirma, and the concept of being “un-homed” as outlined by Homi Bhabha. In considering the artworks from this perspective, this paper hopes to fully recognise the different pressures that contemporary artists from Singapore face when engaging with sanctioned discourse.

Name: Ho Mei Si Estee
Thesis Title: What is Contemporary Art? Exploring “Contemporary” in North Korean Art
Thesis Abstract:
With the rising discourse on ‘the contemporary’ over the last three decades, North Korean art has jumped on the ‘contemporary art’ bandwagon, following its exhibition at the sixth edition of the Asia-Pacific Triennial in 2009. Since then, there have been an increasing number of articles written and exhibitions on contemporary North Korean art. The investigation of what contemporary art is invites us to consider the entry points from which art is defined as ‘contemporary’. Motivated by the visual aesthetics of North Korean art, which exhibits significant influence from Soviet-style Socialist Realist artworks, this study probes into the elements of contemporary art and its relationship to local and global conditions. The inclusion of comparative analysis with the artistic production of surrounding countries such as China, South Korea, the former Soviet Union and Myanmar, reveals how North Korean art can be seen as lowercase ‘contemporary art’, and not uppercase ‘Contemporary art’ within locale-specific and global art standards. This thesis will emphasise the ‘contemporary’ in North Korean art through elements such as ‘conceptual art’, ‘time’ and ‘space’. Additionally, the final chapter suggests another element, “curatorial strategy,” in which we can locate the ‘contemporary’ in North Korean art according to how artworks are presented at different locations and/ or according to curatorial frameworks. The thesis concludes with the defining moment where both leaders of the two Koreas met and crossed over the Korean Demilitarised Zone with held hands. This event, together with the Panmunjom Declaration for Peace, Prosperity and Unification of the Korean Peninsula, suggests a potential social, economic and political breakthrough that might eventually lead to a more vibrant discourse on North Korean art on a global stage.

Name: Ivy Lam
Thesis Title: Should We Picture a Genocide? – Exploring the Role of Photojournalism as Public Art in the Civic Discussion of the Conflicts in Iran, Iraq and Syria
Thesis Abstract:
Transcending its role as evidence or a tool for social change, photojournalism is now regarded as equal with its formalistic counterpart with its entry into art circuits. This regard for photojournalistic works as a public art in a time of image saturation is seen in this thesis as a necessary transition to consider its role as civic discourse. This is pertinent to narratives of the Middle East – in particular, those of countries that have imposed strict barriers to entry for tourists – as photographs are relied on to shape international understandings of the region. The conflicts in Iran, Iraq and Syria, have been represented through a deluge of images of atrocities. As Susan Sontag posits, the persistent circulation of such photographs can develop in viewers a sense of image fatigue or impotence that arises from an inability to alleviate the pain that they have witnessed. Recognising this threat, Robert Hariman and John Louis Lucaites recommend an aesthetic reading of photojournalistic images, and explain how such works should be read as public artworks. It is with this shift in the context of looking that viewers can participate in the civic discourse of what these images represent. By extension, as civic participants and spectators of photojournalistic works, the viewer places himself or herself in the same space as the subject and the photographer, forging what Ariella Azoulay terms a ‘civil contract’. In this contract, the once displaced subject is offered the same rights as the photographer and viewer, when he or she encounters them in the same photographic space. Through the aesthetic reading of pictures of atrocities exhibited in art galleries, photography of the un-photographable, and images of ruinations, this thesis shows how these subjects are participants in this ‘civil contract’ and how, in this process, the civic spectator fulfills the ethics of looking.

Name: Lourdes A Samson
Thesis Title: Interruption: Video Art from the Philippines, 1998-2017
Thesis Abstract:
Video art from the Philippines has gained currency on the global stage in recent years. While its inclusion in prestigious international exhibitions and recognition from various award-giving bodies might suggest that video art is now part of mainstream contemporary art practices in the Philippines, this thesis asserts that it still remains very much on the periphery. These global turns have served to highlight the current dearth of art historical scholarship on video art from the Philippines. This study therefore seeks to shed light on the following key questions: 1) How did video art emerge in the Philippines? 2) How is it being supported locally? 3) How can it continue to develop in the future?

Through primary interviews with key contemporary artists and curators who have consistently worked with the medium of video, this thesis traces video art’s emergence from the alternative visual cultures of experimental film and conceptual art from the late 1990s till the present. It also analyses the ecosystem supporting video art to identify the factors that have fueled Philippine video art’s successes or served to limit its wider acceptance amongst local audiences.

Over the past 20 years, video has been used in various ways to reflect not just social issues but also to explore notions of time and space, memory and identity, performativity and process. Video art’s development over this period was sustained by the established educative and commercial infrastructure for film and visual arts, as well as financial and organisational support that was provided by public and private institutions. On the other hand, video art’s wider appreciation by audiences was challenged by the local market’s continued preference for painting, concerns regarding the medium’s reproducibility, the economic and logistical difficulties of organising dedicated video art exhibitions, as well as the absence of an institution to drive archiving and research initiatives.

In light of these structural challenges, what can the future be for video art in the Philippines? Can these “interruptions” be overcome? Recent initiatives by artists and independent curators suggest that the path towards this future must first be grounded in the past. Such artist-run initiatives can become the common ground upon which the various players in the ecosystem might piece together the origins of video art from anecdotes of lost files and past exhibitions, and begin to build the discourse that will sustain its future.

Name: Noorshidah Ibrahim
Thesis Title: The Gaze and Notions of Identity in the Representation of Balinese Women in the Works of Liu Kang, Cheong Soo Pieng, Chen Chong Swee and Chen Wen Hsi
Thesis Abstract:
The body of work developed by artists Liu Kang, Cheong Soo Pieng, Chen Chong Swee and Chen Wen Hsi, that resulted from a 1952 Bali trip, occupies a very important position in local art history for having played an influential role in the development of modern art in Singapore. These works have been identified as the catalyst behind the development of the artists’ respective aesthetic ideologies and practices, and have also been regarded as the origin of the Nanyang style.

Although these Bali works cover a wide range of subject matter, representations of Balinese women make up a large proportion of the works produced. The pronounced fascination with these women as subject matter, and the manner in which they are depicted calls into question the agency of the artist’s gaze behind these works. Remarkably, the scant available research on these Bali paintings either chooses to ignore or gloss over this fact. Instead, the artists, the trip, the works and their attitude towards their subjects are romanticised. In light of the significance of these works within local art historiography, these representations and the gaze behind them warrants a closer examination.

Taking on a social art historical and psychoanalytical approach, this thesis looks to the social and political landscape of post-war Malaya and Bali around the period these works were produced. Also taking into consideration the artists’ migrant background, this thesis looks at the prevailing ideologies, including those of China, during the first half of the twentieth century in an attempt to analyse the gaze responsible for these representations.

Research for this thesis will illustrate how the Chinese identity of the migrant community in Malaya, became problematic during the post-war years. The idea of ‘Chineseness’, which before the war was a simple one, was now fraught with complexities, as the loyalties of this group were called into question. This thesis will show that the gaze, male and Chinese, that is behind these representations is related to these artists’ notion of the self. In essence, the Balinese female bodies, through their “primitive” markers, serve as foils, at once establishing and affirming these artists’ Chinese identity.

Name: Ramakrishnan Ramesh
Thesis Title: Exploring the Motivations, Modes and Morality of the Photography of Transgender People in South and Southeast Asia.
Thesis Abstract:
Conceptions of gender, sexuality and identity are changing rapidly, accompanied by a growing sense of understanding about LGBTQ communities. Despite the visible presence of hijras in India and kathoeys in Thailand, transgender communities have been marginalised and continue to live in secretive communities, often forced into sex work and existing as part of a unique subculture. However, the truth is that transgender people have made significant contributions to society and, in recent times, have risen to high positions in politics, media and the art world. The uniqueness of changing one’s gender identity has been a subject of curious examination for photographers, artists and sociologists alike. Photography, cinema and visual culture play key roles in facilitating positive changes in perceptions of gender and sexual difference. In this thesis, using a case study approach, I investigate the motivations, modes and morality of the photography of transgender people in India, Thailand and Singapore. I critically examine the work of select Asian photographers including Dayanita Singh, Manit Sriwanichpoom, Sean Lee and others within the larger universe of LGBTQ sociopolitical, historical and photographic discourses, and compare them to international photographers. Crucially, this thesis will focus on the morality of photographing transgender people, locating this question of ethics within specific socio-cultural milieus and different subcultures. In this day of gender fluidity, gender biases and phobias, it is important that these moral issues are framed, analysed and understood in the right context so as to serve the community. Ultimately, this thesis aims to critically validate a structured model — the #3MTG (motivations, modes and morality) in the photography of transgender people, for future analysis.

Name: Rosalie Kwok
Thesis Title: Confronting Demons of the Past: Trauma, Memory and Transforming Identities in the Art of Htein Lin and Sareth Svay
Thesis Abstract:
Genocide under the Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia (1975-1979) and totalitarian military rule in Myanmar (1962-2011) were abominable events in Southeast Asian history that resulted in political repression, torment and catastrophic deaths. Postconflict trauma in both countries gave rise to a small but important body of artworks addressing traumatic memories of these events. These contemporary artistic expressions do not necessarily manifest specific traits that allude to the artists having survived the violence. Instead, these trauma-related artworks produce cathartic relief for their creators and have the capability to evoke empathy in the viewer as a subconscious identification with the trauma expressed. The topic of this thesis seeks to investigate trauma in art in its aesthetic and therapeutic aspects. This thesis will examine theories of trauma and analyse how the cultural-religious framework of Theravada Buddhism, including the principles of dukkha (suffering) and karma (the law of retribution for acts), has helped Cambodia and Myanmar’s populations cope with trauma. I will compare how traumatic memories inspire the artistic expressions of two contemporary artists, namely Cambodian artist Sareth Svay, and Myanmar artist Htein Lin, in view of their respective experiences in these political and historical contexts. Specifically, this study will investigate how traumatic pasts are articulated by both artists through somatic memories by revisiting bodily and spatial experiences, as well as through cultural memories in visual expressions. The vernacular traditions of Khmer and Burmese storytelling inspire a powerful way for the artists to tell their stories of loss and mourning through their art. This thesis will illustrate that the articulation of this memory has a therapeutic significance not just for the artists, but also for their respective communities through a process of reflective critical thinking that can produce reconciliation and healing. Finally, I will also locate trauma art as critical within the visual art practices that have transformed and continue to inspire the cultural landscapes of Cambodia and Myanmar. Ultimately this thesis aims to offer insights into visual expressions of trauma from specific Southeast Asian perspectives vis-à-vis global understandings. These expressions do not deny but confront the demons of a painful unconscious and transform them into a liberating conscious. This thesis hopes that this investigation of an understudied yet significant aspect of art history can add to an array of voices across contemporary artistic expressions in Southeast Asia.

Name: Tanya Singh
Thesis Title: A Cross-Cultural Dialogue: The Modernisms of India and Indonesia
Thesis Abstract:
Modernism, as an aesthetic movement, has been a consistently contested subject in recent art historical discourses, especially with regards to the Asian region. Historically, writings on the development of modernism have been embedded in the social, cultural and political contexts of Europe and the United States. However, recent scholarship has presented the possibility of multiple interpretations of modernism. Further pursuing this awareness of plurality and alterity, this thesis explores a cross-cultural dialogue between the modernisms of India and Indonesia in order to locate a common ground for the comparative study of Asian alternate modernisms. This thesis primarily focuses on the intersection of ideas that occurred in the early twentieth century with regards to parallel political, cultural and social developments in India and Indonesia. In doing so, it establishes an intrinsic relationship between Asian alternate modernisms and nationalism. The thesis explores an inter-Asian cultural dialogue between two regional educational movements in India and Indonesia – Santiniketan and the Taman Siswa schools – facilitated by Rabindranath Tagore and Ki Hadjar Dewantara respectively. These two educational movements became the sites of significant artistic developments in the two countries prompted by the infiltration of modern ideas into the region and consequential nationalistic sentiments.

Name: Tina Jailani
Thesis Title: The City as an Urban Archeological Archive : Archiving the Matrix of Change
Thesis Abstract:
If we look at an object beyond its physicality, can it tell us about changes that have happened in the urban geographical and ecological environment? In a city that is transforming as rapidly as Singapore, physical changes in these environments reshape the temporal and spatial ordering of human experiences, which affect habits, collectivities and memory. The fleeting temporality of urban experiences and the historical detachment of society from place leaves one to sense the immense magnitude of the present – negating connections with the past. Perhaps, the omnipresence of an ‘ahistorical’ condition provokes artists to yearn for a sense of meaning, history and memory as a way of reconciling with the past, which compels them to create imaginative conceptions of the city. This thesis seeks to explore how two of Singapore’s visionary contemporary artists, Robert Zhao and Debbie Ding, explore and recode the matrix of change through the conceptualisation of the archival object. It argues that changes in the urban geographical and ecological environment are embodied in the archival object, and are interconnected through the dimensions of time, place, practice, habit, collectivities and memory. The interdisciplinary practices of Zhao and the Institute of Critical Zoologists, and Ding and the Singapore Psychogeographical Society, inform us of the entanglements between humans and changes in the urban environment. Zhao and Ding present us with alternative perspectives for looking at the urban archeological archive, as well as the speculative potentialities of the archival object to chart the phenomena of a new reality and conceptions of the city.

Name: Connie Wong
Thesis Title: Hong Kong Protest and Arts: Made Invisible Visible. A Case Study of the Umbrella Movement.
Thesis Abstract:
The Umbrella Movement occured in 2014 and lasted for over two months. The significance of the event marks an important reference point in Hong Kong history and has attracted cultural, sociological, political and visual arts research and discourse in recent years. This study focuses on the relationship between aesthetics and politics from an art historical perspective. The overwhelming artistic practices and creative activities observed at the occupied sites became key features of the movement. Art specific research on the Umbrella Movement remains understudied, hence, the germination of the topic for this thesis. To entangle the Umbrella Movement’s complicated and intertwined aesthetic and political elements, I draw upon Jacques Ranciere’s ‘Distribution of Sensible’ concept. First of all, this thesis maps Ranciere’s key points alongside the timeline of the event. Drawing from his concept, the thesis analyses the selected artistic practices and creative activities observed at the Umbrella Movement under the topics of police order, politics of aesthetics against the aesthetics of politics, the spectators’ gaze, dissensual re-configuration and framing of the new landscape. The investigation reveals how aesthetic and political aspects of the movement are related, using examples such as artistic interventions, masked protesters and umbrella symbols, etc. Finally, the thesis concludes with an evaluation of the efficacy of the artistic activities observed within the protests in correspondence to the movement.

Name: Yvonne Chan
Thesis Title: Cynicism of Consumerism in Chinese Contemporary Art : An Alternative View
Thesis Abstract:
This thesis charts the socioeconomic and political development of China, which is mirrored in art developments, in order to illustrate the emergence and narrative of consumerism in Chinese contemporary art. Identifying the key factors that have contributed to the rise of Chinese contemporary art, the thesis investigates their benefits and shortcomings, as well as their impact on the arts eco-system. The thesis unpacks the cynicism reflected by many artists in their works toward consumerism, and frames this as ironic in the sense that it is this same consumerism that has also fueled the meteoric rise of Chinese contemporary art on the global stage. The alternative
view presented in this thesis argues that cynicism towards consumerism is a diabolical response by artists leveraging the consumeristic wave in Chinese contemporary art. Unpacking the cynicism of consumerism through a case study of Wang Guangyi and evaluating the sentiments of other artists in their works toward consumerism, this thesis takes an in-depth look at the motivations behind their works. The overall objective of the thesis is to provide a different perspective on the theme of consumerism. Specifically, this thesis argues that artists were not cynical in their attitude towards consumerism, but simply leveraging popular culture, building their brand personality and reflecting the realities of the times. Despite the shortcomings of consumerism in Chinese contemporary art, the overall nett position is positive, as its long-term implications bode well for contemporary art, artists and China.