I JUST DON'T GET MODERN ART: ENTANGLEMENTS @ OBJECTIFS LOWER GALLERY

Modern art still confounds me. What is it all about? Why do things appear the way they do? What is the purpose of it all? Entanglements, curated by Huijun Lu, brings together the art of five visual artists in the small space that is Objectifs Lower Gallery. Used to seeing bursts of colour and stunning visuals, this exhibition is stark and minimalist.

"Entanglements stems from the belief that nature and technology are not discrete entities, but rather deeply entwined." Not my words, but the artists' description. It goes on to state technology dominates our natural environment, through rapid processes of extraction and destruction. Yet, these tools can aid restoring connections, appreciating slowness and understanding environmental complexity. OK, I give up.

Humpty Dumpty should have
been here to see this.

Modern art just cannot do without
naked bodies (preferably female).

Really this could not be further sharpened.
Now I get the egg part.

So these five artists examine plant systems, human bodies, synthetic materials and sensorial technologies. With natural and man-made systems coming together as collaborators and co-conspirators. Why do they write like this?

More eggs.
What is this supposed to symbolise?

Now its egg crates.

What we really need now are termites.
They make good art too.

ENTANGLEMENTS

Objectifs Lower Gallery, Middle Road

entanglements - Objectifs

I JUST DON'T GET MODERN ART: REFLECTIONS BY RYAN LIM ZI YI

Anywhere else in the world, Esplanade Tunnel would be a scary place. Leading from Citylink Mall and the MRT stations to the basement of Esplanade, this covered path includes advertisement panels on its first stretch and upon making a sharp turn, visual art displays. Despite its air-conditioned comfort and generally bright illumination, it can still feel claustrophobic. Esplanade's website lists it as an 85-metre stretch, but it gives an impression of being three times as long.

If this were USA or Europe, there would be homeless people, drug addicts and miscreants littering its path. In Singapore, we have art instead, much of which I cannot comprehend, including the latest instalment, entitled Reflections by Ryan Lim Zi Yi. So sparse and stark it is, that it feels like a non-event. Much ado about nothing?

There are lamp-posts, illuminations and silhouetted shadows projected on the long wall, and that's about it. Lim describes "a single flying termite at the end of its lifespan" (which I didn't see at first *), "whose final reflections unpack the moments of human existential discomfort, longing and anxiety". In addition, "the swarmer pieces together an understanding of life while confronting the brevity of its own existence". Wow, I never thought a pesky, stinky bug could even empathise with homo sapiens, and vice versa.

We thought we had some fun by
projecting our own silhouettes on the wall.

That's what I call art.

* Guess what, I finally found the little bugger a few days later, accompanied by a recorded voice illuminating its light-seeking thoughts. Look long and hard enough, you'll find new things in art...

(Click on the image if you are near-sighted)

REFLECTIONS

by Ryan Lim Zi Yi

runs till 4 October 2026

 (lots more time to reflect)  

Reflections - Esplanade

HAPPY NATIONAL DAY!

Guess what I found today?

Esplanade Tunnel is a scary place, after all.

I STILL DON'T GET MODERN ART: THE LOFT PAVILION BY KHAIRULLAH RAHIM @ ESPLANADE CONCOURSE

Call me a plebian, but must all modern art have to do with symbolism? The latest installation at Esplanade Concourse entitled The Loft Pavilion replaces the whale skeleton of Ikan Besar Skali. It's a collection of items neatly placed within metal frames and shelves, and partially concealed by beaded curtains.

The explanatory note by visual artist Khairullah Rahim says a lot but tells you nothing, a virtual word salad that includes phrases like "interrogates the politics of visibility and counter-surveillance strategies", and "entangled relations between bodies, objects and the everyday", and "new perspectives on queerness and marginalised lived experiences within hostile environments". 

And "hypervisibility and everyday tactics of navigation", and "operating through camouflage and strategic misdirection" and "evoke aspirations toward accumulation and upward mobility", and "through excess, repetition and precarious elevation". Wow, Kamala Harris would have been mighty proud.

Can we infer that the artist feels threatened because of his race, sexual orientation and disadvantaged socio-economic status, and fears being spied upon and persecuted? And he perhaps copes and lives on by consumption, accumulating wealth and status, or so he thinks.

There is much symbolism in the installation: the pigeons, beer cans, stringed beads, durians, video screens, an odd rock, a workman's outfit and a lone tennis ball. What do all of these mean? This provocative exhibit greeted concertgoers attending Bela Bartok's symbolist opera Bluebeard's Castle (on 24 July), so perhaps there is some relevance here. It might even have something to do with Dick Lee's Cantopop songs (on 25 July). Who knows?

Have another read of it.
Maybe you'll understand it better now.

THE LOFT PAVILION

by Khairullah Rahim

runs till 3 January 2027

(That's a long stretch, which gives

the viewer lots more time to ponder)  

The Loft Pavilion - Esplanade

I STILL DON'T GET MODERN ART: WHERE THE CITY SOFTENS by HANS CHEW

Caution: Men at Work.

I still don't get modern art. Wandering around Esplanade just before Tze Toh's Unwelten piano recital, I chanced upon a new exhibition of modern art called Where The City Softens by local visual artist Hans Chew. At first, I thought part of Esplanade had been fenced off for the usual repairs or restoration, but no, they actually paid someone to do certain installations.

Trying to understand the situation better, some form of explanation had been included. Catch phrases like "inherent value of making" certainly helped to differentiate items which were "functional and non-functional", "essential and the trivial", "discarded and abandoned". There was also on display a "repository of objects that contemplate our anthropic relationship with the material environment".  Yes, that's so much better.

 

I thought I'd have some fun to try and distinguish which parts of the exhibition were essential and which were trivial, and which were functional and non-functional. This reminds me of a game we used to play on Sesame Street, "One of these things is not like the others". So here are the photos.

WHERE THE CITY SOFTENS

by HANS CHEW

Esplanade 3rd floor

The exhibit runs till 23 August 2026

Admission is free

(Would you even pay to view this?)