Hopes for Our Contemporary Art Scene: How to Improve Singapore’s Arts Ecosystem, According to Artists

Abstract

The chapter collates Singaporean artists’ ideas on how to improve the arts ecosystem in Singapore. The artists interviewed in our research study highlight key areas of concerns and areas for potential improvement, which are organized around four main themes in the chapter. These are i) the need for alternative spaces; ii) ways to reduce elitism in the art world; iii) the necessity for real inclusion of marginalized and minority communities and perspectives, especially on the part of larger art institutions; iv) and the resha** of social perceptions towards the arts, via valuing the arts more positively and reforming arts education. The discussions contained in the chapter are further enriched and expanded thanks to the invaluable contributions of four artists, whose perspectives are presented as Afterwords.

Afterwords by Priyageetha Dia, Dawn-joy Leong, Loo Zihan, & anGie seah

Priyageetha Dia

Burn (Still)

Dawn-joy Leong

I am Autistic with multiple medical disabilities—in other words, I am disabled. I use Identity-First terminology to describe myself and I wear my identity as Autistic and disabled proudly, factually, without embellishment. I began my research journey in autism, neurodiversity and disabilities, and my artistic practice overseas, first in Hong Kong, where I premiered my signature multimedia multidisciplinary immersive autobiographical show, which bears the main title, Scheherazade’s Sea. From Hong Kong, I went to Australia to pursue my Ph.D, where my works were subsequently presented, and thereafter in the United Kingdom, South Korea, Singapore and most recently in Japan. Prior to my return to Singapore in 2016, my professional artistic practice has always been situated in the mainstream, and not in the ‘arts and disabilities’ sector or as ‘disability art’—I was known simply as a researcher and artist who happened to be disabled. My work has been shown in major festivals and galleries that were not disability specific, but I was nevertheless given appropriate disability support so that I could access the various physical and mental spaces to deliver my professional work accordingly. This same standard procedure applied to the other artists with disabilities who were practising within the same mainstream spaces.

As a researcher and multidisciplinary artist, I read with interest the issues raised in this chapter on “hopes”. It was a quick and easy read, that is, there were no complex ideas being expounded, every conundrum highlighted herein is familiar to me: the need for mental and physical space, the wish for a less elitist and more egalitarian system, the call for greater inclusion of the marginalised and underrepresented, and the desire for the arts to be held in higher esteem and better valued by society. I sense a palpable weariness and perhaps even guarded fear in the voices of the artists being cited, embedded within an over-arching sincerity, conviction and passion for their work. What is disappointing, however, was that throughout the conversation about inequality, the cries against privileged establishment, the disappointment of unmet needs, and hopes for a better future, there is not one deliberate mention of disability or the challenges faced by disabled artists. Perhaps this is where I may step in and offer insights from this neglected paradigm. I reflect upon the four main categories in this chapter and the main topic of “Hope,” from the viewpoint of a practising artist, researcher and disabled person.

Since returning to Singapore, I have noticed that in most mainstream publications about the arts and artists in Singapore, we—disabled artists—are seldom even mentioned at all, making us seem non-existent, without a voice of our own outside of the delegated ‘arts and disabilities’ space. Is this because disability is a taboo subject that nobody in wider society wants to acknowledge, and/or because the artistic community here in Singapore does not even think disabled persons can be professional artists in mainstream spaces?

One cannot talk with any credibility about matters of equity or justice in any domain if the disabled among us are erased, ignored or relegated to silos away from wider society. There can be no sincerity in any call for inclusion or recognition of diversity if disability is not fully and equally included—the symphonic chorus of ‘diversity and inclusion’ rings empty, or dull and out of tune.

To the non-disabled reader, you might wonder what I am talking about, you might even be a little affronted at this seemingly ‘unfair assertion’, because you are being made ‘aware’ about disabilities through the plethora of campaigns in public and social media, and there has been a great deal of talk around diversity and inclusion in recent years, so much so it even feels like a ‘trendy thing’ nowadays. That may be true from the perspective of the non-disabled. However, here is what I, a disabled artist with extensive mainstream experience outside of Singapore, have observed in my homeland since returning in late 2016. I notice a surge of ‘awareness’ campaigns, mostly about being kind and charitable towards disabled people. In the arts, there is a growing number of organisations and collectives mostly fronted by the non-disabled or together with a tokenised disabled person who may or may not be an established practising artist, all scrambling aboard the ‘disability bandwagon’. Some look to be sincere and well intentioned but ignorant or without depth of understanding about the disabled paradigm; others with obvious agenda emblazoned across their foreheads who deliberately ignore the voices of actual disabled artists when their ‘inclusive’ activities are called out and questioned. There is no disabled artist in a leadership position in any large disability-focused arts organisations or the Arts and Disability Forum held annually, the latter of which is jointly organised by the National Arts Council and ART:DIS (formerly known as Very Special Arts Singapore), with support from the British Council.

Disabled artists know a great deal about disability, and the lack of Space in the arts. Disabled artists in Singapore do not enjoy much space, if any at all, for our creative development outside of the charity models that bind us to the bottom of the “non-essential” heap. We occupy precious little mental space in the grand realm of inequalities, in fact, we are not even mentioned much at all. The truthful realities about disability are obfuscated and seen as almost a bête noire unless they can be pulverised, re-shaped and transformed into a more palatable form for public consumption, presented by non-disabled actors, written by non-disabled playwrights, directed by non-disabled directors, produced by non-disabled producers—all without any professional advice or consultation with actual disabled persons, and of course devoid of disabled leadership (“What is that, is there such a thing as disabled leadership?” you may even ask).

I shall relate a few true experiences to illustrate my point.

Shortly after I returned to Singapore in late 2016, I was approached by an author to contribute a chapter to her book consisting of personal stories written by autistic adults in Singapore. She is a non-autistic mother to an autistic young person, has published several books about parenting an autistic child and gives talks as if she is an authority on autism. Having practised overseas and thus being accustomed to receiving fair payment for my expertise and time, I asked her about remuneration or a share in royalties, and she instantly said no, she could not afford to pay from her own pocket for the contents of her own book and she does not earn much at all from royalties anyway. I could sense a prickly tone to her curt reply, as if affronted. I told her that if she was willing to share even one dollar from her ten dollars of royalties with each of us, it would already stand out as reassurance of sincerity. Needless to say, I declined to participate. A number of autistic adults were nevertheless willing to share their stories, and one of them told me that he did so because he was quite desperate to have a voice in the wider scheme of things. This author offered ‘exposure’ and nothing more, and many autistic adults, after a lifetime of being silenced, were therefore eager to participate, even if it meant being taken advantage of. I have never heard of any occasion where this author actually invited any autistic adult to co-present and be paid in any of her paid speaking engagements where she was invited to speak about autism and promote her books.

Then there was an arts group that claims to be socially conscious and community focused that approached me to speak at an event they were hosting. When I enquired about a speaker’s fee, I was once again faced with a bristly reaction. “No budget!” had, by then, become quite a buzzword among those who do not consider the disabled as worthy of being budgeted for from the very start of their projects but then have no qualms about exploiting a disabled person’s time and energies for their own ends, touted as “a good cause”. I point out time and time again, that they, the non-disabled, can survive because many either hold full time jobs or are able to work at many different jobs, whereas most disabled artists in Singapore are either unemployed or simply unable to manage several jobs simultaneously and thus can hardly make ends meet. However, they did not leave it there, but ventured further to chide me, saying that as an ‘experienced artist’ I should be giving talks for free, in order to ‘inspire’ young aspiring artists. My reply was this: If young aspiring artists see that experienced artists, their supposed role models, especially those with disabilities, are required to work entirely for free, and even dig into their own pockets and pay a heavy personal price¹⁶ to do unpaid work, why in the world would they even aspire to become artists in the future? I cannot think from any reasonable perspective how ‘inspiring’ poverty and exploitation can be. There was, of course, by now a familiar roaring silence, which spoke volumes to me. Later, I did hear that they had begun to pay other disabled artists to give talks after this miniature fiasco, and though I was never asked by them again, I feel that the insult and consequences I suffered over this fracas was well worth it, if it helped to bring the message across in some small way.

On another occasion, I was contacted by a film company who told me they were producing a television series about some female autistic IT genius. Two young executives asked me if I would be their Autistic consultant to look out for accuracy of representation. They already had a non-autistic clinical psychologist in the team. I was delighted at first, but when I said my expertise comes with a fee, they baulked. Their producer said there was nothing in their budget for a consultant, but please, please, pretty please could I come on board anyway, and follow the actress around the set and give her educated, knowledgeable lived-experience advice for free? Please? As a ‘friend’? I was flabbergasted at the last plea. I had never met these two young persons before this, and now they want me to work for free as their ‘friend’! I told them that my real friends would never ask me to do work for free. The audacity was utterly confounding.

I once performed in a show about disability at a well-known venue and arts company that likes to promote ‘accessibility and inclusivity’ as part of their branding. One of our cast was a wheelchair-user, but the artists’ dressing rooms were on the second floor. I myself was struggling with a painful arthritic flare. When I enquired about a lift, I was told, sorry this is a heritage building and no alterations can be done to the original structure. Our director ended up having to physically carry the wheelchair user up and down two flights of steep, narrow stairs to and from the artists’ dressing rooms—during rehearsal breaks and before and after the performance. I shall not elaborate further on the humiliating experience for both wheelchair user artist and director. Artists are supposed to be creative people, and if they were sincere about their claims to being inclusive, they would have created a small little space on the first (ground) floor at the foyer—it did not even need to be a permanent structure, a temporary space with curtains for privacy would have worked well enough. Nobody was using the foyer at the time anyway.

Another recent experience that left a decidedly unpleasant after-taste was my brush with an advertising agency engaged to produce ‘awareness’ videos about disability. The international company, with a hefty and impressive portfolio that included famous Singapore brands, wanted to hear from disabled people their personal stories, and it sounded promising because I was told we would be given some creative control over how we wanted to shape the campaign. I was in for a rude shock, however, when I read the terms and conditions of the contract. In essence, we, the disabled people sharing our personal life stories, were asked to sign away our rights to our own words, image and life story completely, unquestioningly and in perpetuity without recourse, to the advertising agency to treat in any way they liked. We would also surrender all rights to disagree or protest any misrepresentation, and could not even withdraw from the project. Of course, I vehemently objected with my customary outspoken vim and vigour, and the advertising agency amended the contract into a less blatantly exploitative one, giving disabled volunteers a chance to withdraw from the project, but the agency still did not engage any disabled professional consultant, as far as I know. I have, of course, declined to be involved in this project. This shocking debacle underlined a pressing point: the stories of disabled people need to be told, but are best relayed by the disabled themselves. As for me, I have decided it is time to tell my story myself, in my own way—multi-media disability-friendly (universally accessible and inclusive) memoirs coming up, please watch for it—Scheherazade is stirring in her Sea again!

Each time I am faced with such scenarios, two key issues stand out repeatedly. First and foremost, the people producing, participating in, and funding ‘artistic’ or ‘creative’ content featuring disability and disabled persons—be it film, advertisements, theatre, music concerts, art exhibitions, short videos, educational material, workshops or events etc.—are mostly non-disabled and seldom have on board a disabled professional consultant. In the case of theatre, television or film, the disabled characters or roles are almost always played by non-disabled artists. There is no thought at all for consultation with any actual disabled professional (although there are many competent advisors around the world and a very small handful in Singapore who offer such services), demonstrating complete disregard for accurate representation of disability and disrespect for disabled professionals. The non-disabled producers and directors think they know better how to present disability than actual disabled persons. Perhaps they assume their audiences would be mostly non-disabled and none the wiser anyway, and even if a disabled person or two may watch the show, the opinions of the minority do not matter at all, so long as ticket sales and ratings are not affected?

Secondly, these non-disabled organisers, producers, directors and actors become extremely defensive when called out. The most common excuse I hear is, “Sorry no budget!”, or “Well, I’ve done a lot of research!” but they then proceed to use offensive or wrong terminology, all of which show they never thought about proper disability representation in the first place, since disability and the disabled community are merely token appendages and afterthoughts to their plan to benefit from the ‘grand disability circus’. More often than not, suggestions and advice voluntarily proffered by disabled professionals like myself are blatantly ignored because it doesn’t fit into their agendas. I have experienced consistently callous, even somewhat aggressive disregard for the opinions of the disabled in many such productions or even paid workshops about disability put up by non-disabled entities touting the “inclusive” branding. Inevitably, inaccuracies permeate the end-products, perpetuating urban myths about disability, and become nothing much more than glossy feel-good “inspirational porn.”¹⁷ Perhaps they get away with such preposterous attitudes because the majority of their clientele—their patrons, audiences and paying customers—are non-disabled, either ignorant or ableist, who will applaud them, and even cry at these slick, polished productions, saying how touchingly disability was represented. They may even win a few awards or accolades too, which they have no intention to share with any disabled people, not even those whose stories they’ve capitalised on (hence the preposterous terms and conditions in these contracts mentioned in a preceding paragraph).

At this point, I must assert, in all fairness, that it is not an entirely hopeless situation. There are arts organisations and institutions who do pay attention to disabled artists and do their best to ensure proper representation of disability, hire and remunerate professional disabled artists, strive to provide adequate accessible and inclusive training to aspiring disabled artists, and even involve disabled arts professionals in creative decision-making. However, these tend to operate mostly within the ‘arts and disability’ silo and the work produced by their disabled artists are looked down upon as poor quality, sub-standard art by the mainstream arts community. These organisations battle the unspoken pervasive attitude that disability and disabled artists are not to be taken seriously, unless they can be exploited for the benefit of the non-disabled. In recent years, many major arts venues and institutions are also beginning to embrace the process of providing access and inclusion to the disabled community, and a number of them—like the Disabled People’s Association and Equal Dreams, are beginning to hire disability professionals as consultants to help design their fledgling access and inclusion programmes. Most of these ‘enlightened’ institutions, however, focus heavily on the disabled arts consumers, wanting (rightfully) to draw more of the disabled community into their premises and performances etc. However, not many have shown much willingness to break with ‘tradition’ to support actual disabled artists through commissions or staging events and running programmes. One exception, in my personal experience, is the National Gallery Singapore. In 2020, I became the first autistic artist to be commissioned by a major arts institution for a solo exhibition, a new iteration of my other signature immersive installation, Clement Space, about conducive space for mental wellbeing designed according to natural autistic self-co** mechanisms and shared with the wider community. Simultaneously, the National Gallery also commissioned Singapore’s first theatre promenade featuring a cast of six differently disabled artists, conceptualised and directed by theatre veteran, Peter Sau. The National Gallery Singapore also commissioned me as Community Consultant to coordinate a series of participatory research workshops with volunteers from the neurodivergent community (autism, Down syndrome, ADHD, dyslexia, dementia etc.) and to lead the co-design of their recently launched Calm Room, again a first in Singapore that is open to the public and not reserved only for autistic children or the disabled or autistic. The National Gallery’s extensive access support facilities for visitors were also designed in consultation with the Disabled People’s Association. People sometimes ask me why I cite the National Gallery so favourably and not other organisations. My answer is straight-forward and truthful: I do not know of any other organisation in Singapore that has put the words “access and inclusion” into such extensive and concrete practice, walking the talk, being willing to forge ahead and boldly step into groundbreaking territory with such confidence and dedication, not only where arts consumers are concerned but additionally and more importantly where it comes to disabled professional artists too. It is my belief that support for the disabled arts consumer is only half of access and inclusion, there must be equal if not more robust support for disabled professional artists in order to activate true access and inclusion, justice and equity, and respect for diversity.

Where it comes to public funding in Singapore, I am unaware of anything outside the arts and disabilities arena or beyond the charity model that specifically provides for professional disabled artists’ access needs. I once asked at a supposedly ‘high level’ meeting of well-known arts professionals in Singapore if there could be some kind of ‘top-up’ grant or fund for disabled artists who manage to get funding via mainstream channels, for the specific purpose of disability support. The reply was, “Thank you for your passion and caring for the disabled, but it’s too complicated, too difficult.” That was that. End of discussion—or rather, no discussion at all. The other non-disabled artists hurriedly moved along, nobody spoke up for or with me, everyone was too eager to grab their own piece of the already tiny pie. It is not widely understood or acknowledged that the mere existence of a disabled person is financially costlier than that of the non-disabled, and providing adequate access and true inclusivity involves willingness to reach beyond mere ‘awareness’ of our existence, to actively and vigorously support equity and intrinsic, autonomous development. Without dedicated funding, disabled artists are expected to compete with non-disabled artists for limited financial support inside a system focused solely on meeting the needs of only the non-disabled. Here is a simple analogy: The current public funding system for any disabled artist who wishes to practice in the mainstream arena is akin to a benevolent invitation to the disabled person, for example, a wheelchair user, to participate in a grand party, which is taking place on the second floor of a building with no lifts. However, the wheelchair user has to leave their wheelchair on the ground level and crawl up the stairs to the party, as nobody wants to build a ramp or provide a lift because it is too much a hassle and not worth the additional expenditure. If the disabled person does not wish to or is unable to crawl upstairs, they could get someone non-disabled to carry them upstairs to the party. Nobody cares how the disabled person is to find this someone, let alone the embarrassment and humiliation. The pervasive attitude is, “Well, we invited you to the party, didn’t we? Be grateful and stop complaining! Why are you always asking for special treatment?” The disabled person’s needs are ignored altogether; the charity model of disability is applied, where the disabled person is the recipient of altruism or benevolence but denied any self-determination; and an ableist attitude pervades society as a whole. Lack of disability support, and not disability itself, therefore presents a serious problem to disabled artists who want to develop their artistry beyond existing goodwill charitable models towards achieving competent professionalism. ‘Crawling up the stairs’ is not merely demeaning, but also extremely exhausting. How much can anyone enjoy the ‘party’ thereafter? And what kind of party is this, anyway?

I was most fortunate to receive a Creative Grant from the National Arts Council for my experimental work, Scheherazade’s Sea: continuing journey 2021, an autobiographical mixed-medium, multidisciplinary digital fantasia featuring a cast of differently disabled artists at varying stages of their artistic journeys—from the complete novice, to emerging artist and professional. The grant does not have additional support for disability, so I, as Chief Artist and Creator, had to take money from my own artist’s fee, as well as ask for help from ART:DIS as creative collaborator, so that I could provide the most basic disability support in terms of transportation and personnel for preparatory workshops, rehearsals and filming days. Peter Sau was director of performance, courtesy of ART:DIS. I had no money left in the small grant to hire a post-production team apart from one sound engineer, so I took on all the visual elements in post-production—I learned from scratch about video editing, and specifically how to create special effects, and even paid out of my own pocket for a new computer powerful enough to run the required complex video editing software, because my own laptop was incapable of those tasks. Of course, I am incredibly proud of my achievement, especially because I managed to complete it all within just ten weeks, and I am thrilled to have gained many new skills, insights and knowledge in the process, all of which I am looking forward to improving and applying to future projects. However, the intensity and rigorous demands of this undertaking in this context and situation were extremely detrimental to my already fragile physical health. In other words, I am grateful to have been invited to the prestigious party, but since I could not afford any disability support for myself and the party host did not wish to provide that to me, I had to crawl all the way up to the party. Half a year later, I am still bearing the consequences where it comes to my medical disabilities. Yes, hardship does build a certain kind of resilience, and disabled artists are extremely determined and ‘tough’ for want of a better word, but at what cost? And is it really necessary? The energy and time spent on this battlefield could and should have instead been put into creating fuller, richer and more creative art work. Is it any wonder that disabled artists in Singapore appear to be less ‘competent’ or ‘professional’ than the non-disabled? The arts community in Singapore, as a collective whole, seriously needs to engage in some deep soul searching, especially those who like to claim accessibility and inclusivity as part of their vision and mission.

This was not how I experienced my artistic practice outside of Singapore. When I was invited to present my first solo mixed media show, Scheherazade’s Sea, at the World Stage Design Festival in Cardiff, UK, in 2013, I was asked ahead of time if I needed any supports or accommodations for my disability. The organiser also provided me with one stagehand to help me with setting up the stage and managing equipment. In the same year, I presented a paper at an academic conference in Oxford University, UK. The first room allocated to me in the adjoining hostel did not have a lift, and there was a lot of sensory disturbance coming from other conference participants—noise in the late night, messy toilet habits etc.—which caused significant distress to my Autistic hypersenses. I requested for a change in room, citing my reasons, and I was promptly offered a room in the newer tower where there was a lift, and an ensuite bathroom. They even apologised profusely for the oversight. When I was commissioned to present two of my works at the Big Anxiety Festival, Sydney, in 2017, there was no additional funding for disability support, but the organiser assigned a personal assistant to help me with setting up and other small administrative matters so that I would not need to become overwhelmed and stressed trying to handle everything on my own, or scrape from the small grant to hire my own help. During my Ph.D. scholarship tenure at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, I was provided with all the supports that I requested for, without having to fight tooth and nail for any of it. I was allocated a slightly larger studio space within the shared common room for research postgraduates to accommodate Lucy, my sensory alert assistance dog, at the far end where it was the most quiet and there was the least human traffic, so that my hyper senses would not be unduly stressed. I brought Lucy everywhere I went—lectures, workshops, meetings, art galleries, museums etc.—we traveled as a team, just like a blind or vision impaired person with their guide dog. She helped me to regulate my sensory anxiety and prevent overload and meltdown. With Lucy, I was able to travel independently, I did not need any human to ‘carry me upstairs to the party’. My disability support needs were so well taken care of that I could focus intently on my Ph.D.—which was a practice-based piece of research on autism, neurodiversity and multi-art praxis—and the icing on the cake was being awarded the Dean’s Award at the end, which I neither knew about nor expected. All I wanted was to put all I had—my energies, time and creativity—into my Ph.D., and I was fortunate to have been well supported in my grand expedition. Disability support is not ‘special privilege’, it is necessary equity, to bring everyone into a level playing field. My work still had to speak for itself and be assessed according to the prevalent standards, alongside everyone else, but with disability supports, I could then give my all to the work at hand, unhindered by my disability. I did not have to crawl. I took the lift.

Freelance artists in Singapore have to struggle for very little in the way of financial security, but what is not highlighted at all in this exhausting and discouraging situation is that disabled artists face an even more difficult set of circumstances—in fact, obliteration is too mild a description for the disabled artist’s predicament, yet the non-disabled world will no doubt judge this as a dramatic over reaction. It is all well and good, and even poignantly valid, for non-disabled artists to speak about hopes for a better and more supportive environment for the arts, but can or should this happen without including the disabled practitioner? How do we speak about our ‘hopes’ and ‘dreams’, if our most fundamental access to training and professional practice is lacking or deemed unimportant, and all our hard work is restricted to awkward trenches marked only for the disabled? As a disabled artist who has always practised in mainstream spaces outside of Singapore, where I never once had to fight for fair disability access support, here are my concluding questions directed at the arts world and its hierarchies in my homeland: Whose lenses is society looking through when disability is presented in the arts and media? Are diversity, fair access and inclusion really the motivation behind the splendid brouhaha of ‘disability awareness’? How many are willing to match their declarations of ‘diversity’, ‘accessibility’ and ‘inclusion’ with concrete, adequate action?

Change is happening. At this point of time, the positive change is occurring because of the passionately determined and even sometimes simply “thick-skinned” hard work of disabled artists and our few non-disabled allies. The change may be slow, and I may not even get to enjoy the benefits in my own lifetime. Yet, I am an artist at heart, an optimistic dreamer, and so, it is my personal hope that there will someday no longer be a need to separate the arts into ‘mainstream’ and ‘arts and disability’, and all disabled persons aspiring to become artists will enjoy the fair and reasonable supports they need to realise their dreams, and all disabled professional artists will be given the same respect here in my homeland Singapore that I have enjoyed overseas throughout my decades long career as a researcher and practising artist. My hope for the arts in Singapore, in a nutshell? An arts scene that operates “based on justice and equality, so as to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation”.¹⁸

Loo Zihan

I begin with caveats, namely that I am writing this remotely while pursuing my Ph.D. in the United States. This provides a critical distance, but is also mired in the problems that have been gestured to by the selection of voices in this chapter itself. As structured by the writer, these voices have pointed to the intellectualism and elitism that have been introduced to artistic production in Singapore through its interface with the international art market. I find delicious irony in producing research about a seemingly coherent constituency that gestures reflexively to the trap**s of intellectual discourse and language, and my invited response to the chapter on “hope” is itself an optimistic parsing out of inherent assumptions and contradictions that undergird this chapter, symptomatic of artistic thought not just in Singapore, but also in the rest of the world.

I would like to pick up on a minor note in the conclusion of this chapter, namely the nature motif that we employ frequently and loosely when we talk about art, and spend some time hesitating over its uncritical employment. We have often referred to the scene in Singapore as an “arts ecology”, and the organic metaphor continues to rear its head through the ventriloquized edited voices in words like “ground up”, “fermentation”, “brewing” and its associations with the earth and the natural. There is an inherent uninterrogated bias towards nature as desired and good, and most importantly, something that can be easily differentiated from the artificial or man-made. This binaristic logic extends uninterrogated through association with values that have been pegged to artistic production, distinguishing worthy or good artistic production—as “sincere”, “authentic”, spontaneous and original—from those that are not. This binary, fed to us through the art education system, which is in turn influenced by the pragmatics of the international art market, is something that we have to be very cautious in citing and reproducing. The reason we have to be wary about the natural/artifice divide is because it is this same division that supports some of the other issues raised in this chapter, namely that of elitism and gatekee**, but also the pressure for exposure, vulnerability and disclosure. The logic of an art market is structured around the scarcity of artistic genius and the commodifiable objects that the prodigal figure of the artist produces. The romanticized and untenable position that a “real” artist is a delinquent martyr figure that stands in opposition to the State—this produces the weary exhaustion that Farizi Noorfauzi speaks about, this “burden of representation” that a minority artist can often be saddled with. Three main contradictions that come to mind as I review the voices collected and edited in this chapter: How do we encourage a “ground-up” “arts community” that is independent of state funding, without defaulting to being beholden to the interests of private collectors and the art market? Can artistic practice be free from the anxiety of influence—be it creative or financial—and instead of the pursuit of uninhibited autonomy, is it not more effective to question the role of the art in exposing these structures of control? Finally, how can we both call for art to be instrumental and integral to daily existence without it becoming instrumentalized?

By step** outside of this nature/artifice binary, and recognizing how the natural is intertwined with the artificial, and vice-versa, we are able to conjure up more complex strategies to tackle these contradictions. In brief—there is nothing natural about Singapore, nature is always-already entangled and part of man-made construct, we are reminded constantly about this in our national garden/city narrative and our daily existence in this highly manicured environment. I suggest we take a third approach and consider the shades of gray that potentially exist between these binary categories, particularly when it comes to issues of independence, freedom, and rights-based conversation. A nuanced and critical approach will permit us to be careful about anti-intellectualism, and interrogate what specific aspects of intellectualism and research-based practices enable elitism and gatekee**, and what extends the critical limits of artistic possibilities—and be able to separate the chaff from the wheat (and other particles that are caught up in the mix) however painstaking or tedious this task may be. For example, anGie Seah speaks about scholastic culture at the School of the Arts. In full disclosure, I taught there as a part-time educator for several years in the mid-2010s. From an arts educator’s perspective, it is the type of scholastic culture that is being encouraged that should be interrogated, instead of a swee** argument that the dislocated excerpt from Seah’s interview appears to be encouraging that conflates intellectualism with elitism. For me, the critical thinking that is enabled by the International Baccalaureate system that centers on understanding the “theory of knowledge”—or an epistemological investigation of knowledge systems and how they came to be—is key to scaffolding a curious artistic mind. These forms of critical intellectual practices should be encouraged over intellectualism that intends to promote a sense of differentiated elitism and reproduce uncritical contemporary art-speak. It will be these intellectual practices that will encourage an awareness around rights-based conversations that was also raised in this chapter. Without a critical understanding and conversation around rights, which lays a common foundation to build upon, it will be impossible for us to even begin to talk about labor and human rights within an artistic context.

To return to an earlier observation about the artist as martyr, this criticality will also encourage the ability for an artist to understand how and why they are being instrumentalized by the state and its counterparts. This will equip an artist to handle questions of representation without being saddled with the burden of tokenism or the fear of ellison. The central paradox of the figure of the Singaporean artist is the logic of international art liberalism and the friction it produces when rubbing up against a Singaporean political regime intolerant of dissent. When credibility and legitimacy is earned by adopting and performing the role of the delinquent, this creates a crucible of antagonism that Singaporean artists have been negotiating with for generations. I, like Zarina Muhammad, would like us to to give ourselves the permission to pause, not just from the mindless drive of mechanistic productivity, but more importantly, taking time to understand the constituent forces that act upon the pressures of artistic production in Singapore, and the longer-term psychological toll that this might have on the psyche of the artist-pariah.

In conclusion to this brief response, artistic production that thrives is a reflection of the desires and drives of society-at-large. The scholastic emphasis on research-based, immaterial practices that have emerged over recent years mirrors the infrastructure of labor and value in the Singaporean economy. Perhaps in this reflection we can question why this has evolved into an artistic tendency, and wield it as a way to demonstrate alternative ways to being and surviving.

anGie seah

Verse

Verse             Research on the exemplification of written theories and                       collected histories is insufficient for me.

Verse

Verse               Life and living experience, intuition as an artist, and                  keen observation and compassion for immediate                    society and communities are more important.

Verse

Verse               My research adds layers to and deepens the purpose                              of all of my artistic endeavours.

Verse

Verse               In other words, I live the research to breathe life into                               others through art connections.

Verse

Verse                Here's how I imagine an ideal art space where Art                                             reflects life.