P is going home

 I don't know P. 

But this kind of thing happens to me often because of the work that I do. Or Post-Museum do. 

People sometimes say goodbye and share their experience of Singapore. How we met. How we done something together or some event that they came. 

This is a story of P. leaving. With J, we visited P., who would be leaving Singapore after 20-plus years. These moments are so private and personal. Mainly to help clear the last few items because if not given a new home, it will go to the landfill heaven. 

This is like a treasure hunt of sorts, one may find treasures or something that one refuses to throw away. 

Occasionally, we encounter a crossroads where we decide where to turn and what to do. Who knows what lies ahead.

P. shared some anecdotes about her items and life. Like, which of these materials are potential for an art work. P. gifts some items for our free market too.

[place holder for pictures of that night] 

Waiting for a haircut.

Studio days -- means hanging out more in the west coast area.

Now waiting for a haircut at West Coast Plaza.

West Coast Plaza is a sleepy town.

doodles and we think

haha, sometimes i feel surrounded by this. Within the mode of self-congratulatory practice, one loses that sense of criticality and openness. 

after ONO... One Night Only

Jen communicating with Tree

Last tutorial session on thursday. Watched Ursula. Dumpster dived. Home and packing our archive.

Nxt day is the ONE NIGHT ONLY where the participants of my Welcome to the Jungle Workshop - present their work.

With that over, it is the period for exam. We will be leaving for Taiwan 19nov, back on the 2nd nov.

Then back again to Tainan... in a week to prepare for the Lessons Amongst Trees installation.

Da Gua, just before her party for a kid in the Da Mei Sha Village

 Still working on the essay for IDEAS FEST. Processing the photos backlog... sharing here those from Shenzhen, 24th Dec 2017. Yes, christmas eve.

Xiao Peng and Hao's installation

Da Mei Sha view

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Outside the other biennale parallel event.

Meeting Tita and Riksa.

Pursuit of realness

View of Rehearsal

Browsed through On Kawara's phaidon book. Within the book were some works which I have never seen. It was an enjoyable read actually. I would recommend it. Of course he is more than DATE Paintings. Basically, he is a busy man - going about his routines.

He makes me think that I am not defragmenting enough.

Here goes:

30 Jan - attended the 'old left' CNY luncheon. A time to reflect on the history of the detained. After which, we had coffee and spoke with an ex-detainee where she shared on the need to use a more complex lens to look at the past.

Finished Rehearsal in January and started working on the documentation.
see here: http://postmuseum.wordpress.com/2017/01/25/rehearsal-2017/


Working out a new essay about the Post-Popup project for a NTU CCA publication and making some additions to the documentation of Post-Museum's work between 2016-2017.

Jen and me went to Substation's opening of the Co-Op. Caught up with some friends.

Ate at a veg place.

Had tutorials with my BA year 2 group.

Looked at Rudi's extendable fibreglass poles - trying to figure out which ones to fix and replace.

A talk in Melbourne and conference on fri - then mod

A talk in Melbourne this Wednesday. I am not going there but doing it via skype or something like that. ISn't internet nice and thinking we should do these cross-border dialogue like these. Less carbon footprints right.

ANCER conference on Fri to Sun.

Then moderating the post-screening discussion this Sunday at Freedom Film Fest.

All these while writing a new 13 week Southeast Asia contemporary art course at ADM for next year. It is a very fun course to work on and builds on this new body of research work to think through narrative of SE Asia Contemporary art. A great opportunity to read through or rather to read more in depth some of these 'key' texts, 'flash points', entry points in the story of art in this region.

What a day.

What a day indeed.

Thanks for everyone's concern. Will be updating in a few days or in a week. wrapping my head around it.

Transmission out.

What's the story of this antique 'vase'?

I was visiting our friend, Rainer's place in Frankfurt and he showed me this antique piece. His mother was working in someone's house and it was gift from him. 

We were thinking maybe it is an urn but these are really just guesses.  

Wondering if anyone knows what this is? Please share. 

Working on a book chapter

We have for the longest time been working on this book chapter. Finally after 8 drafts, we have some decent version to submit as draft to the editors. 

Now,  we got to tidy up and cut down on words as we are 200% over the word limit. Will I get to sleep. 

I dreamt I ate a chocolate bar

dream drawing.

Rivers, streams and unicornism

I came across this article by Common Dreams:

30 Things You Didn’t Know About Rivers
byPeter Bosshard


The article talks about 30 things we don't know about rivers. For example:

•  Rivers are some of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet. Rivers and lakes sustain more fish species than the sea even though they contain 600 times less water.
•  Rivers are the cradles of our civilizations. Our most ancient cultures sprang up along rivers such as the Tigris and Euphrates, the Nile, the Indus, and the Yellow.
• Rivers shape our planet and have created some of its most beautiful landscapes. Think of the Grand Canyon, the Iguaçu and the Victoria Falls!
• At most, 64 of our 177 longest rivers remain free-flowing, and many of them are threatened by fragmentation.
• Because of over-exploitation, once mighty rivers like the Colorado, Indus, Nile, Rio Grande and Yellow are struggling to reach the sea.
• Have you read Huckleberry Finn, Heart of Darkness, and A River Runs Through It? Rivers have inspired great literature in many countries.
• Another 3,700 hydropower dams are currently under construction or in the pipeline. Many of them are located in river basins with high ecological values such as the Amazon and Mekong.
•  Rivers are the arteries of our planet. By connecting lands, lakes and the sea, they enable the circulation of nutrients, sediments, and living beings.
• Rivers contain only 0.003% of the water on Earth – one out of every 33,000 water molecules – but sustain much of her life. They deserve our protection!

The above work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.  - Published on Thursday, July 16, 2015 by Common Dreams

I thought I read somewhere that Singapore has about 130 rivers & streams. I apologise about this if you have heard this from me.Well, I can't find it now so I think I may have remembered wrong. I need to verify this again.

However, I found about 24 rivers on our main island, 8 rivers that are dammed and 17 off shore rivers, 49 rivers in total here. I can't find anything on streams in Singapore [1] .

When we think of rivers around the world, I think of Singapore's rivers. Do we think of them in the same way? Are our rivers important cradles of civilisations, diverse ecosystems (any of the above points)?

Basically, the article argues that rivers deserve our protection. I am not sure how many people are convinced by this rhetoric of land scarce Singapore and has no natural resources. Therefore, we cannot have the luxury like other countries and as a result we must sacrifice many things.

This is 'unicornism'. A Singapore so unique in this world that no other logic but it's own would work. If you remember not too long ago, the Singapore's government spoke about Asian Values as opposed to the western form of liberalism [2]. Unicornism is equally screwed up.

Most of our rivers are made into canals and there are many man made interventions (like the cleaning up of the Singapore River) [3]. In that sense, the canals do not resemble river's natural state anymore. However, I am glad Nparks and PUB naturalised parts of the Kallang river at the Ang Mo Kio Bishan Park. That came at a hefty price of $76 million dollars just to make it back to what it really is [4 & 5].

In addition, some irresponsible and uninformed people released foreign and invasive species into our waterways [4].

As a result, our local species of fishes have been slowly diminishing [5]. See below are a short list of them.

The following fishes have all almost certainly vanished, unable to adapt to the changing conditions of an urbanised Singapore. Fortunately, they are still present in Malaysia. Every effort must now be made to ensure that the remaining natural fish fauna does not go the same way!


Clown Barb
Puntius dunckeri
Cyprinidae


Tinfoil Barb
Barbodes schwanenfeldii
(Cyprinidae)


Kawan
Labiobarbus festivus
(Cyprinidae)
Photo: Esther Koh


Sebarau
Hampala macrolepidota
(Cyprinidae)
Photo: Esther Koh


Head-band Rasbora
Rasbora cephalotaenia
(Cyprinidae)


Banded Leaf Fish
Pristolepis fasciata
Pristolepidae

Our rivers and these fishes are also natural resources. Just that you can't eat them doesn't make them less of a resource. The next time we say that Singapore have no resources and the only way for progress is to develop the land. We should think again our basic perception of this development rhetoric. Our remaing rivers, waterways and wildlife in it are just as important.

What a show...

This is my old entry from wordpress blog. Defragmenting my world focuses on writing, a form of sketchbook documenting processes and thoughts. And defragment my huge collection of stuf. 

The woontienwei wordpress is more about the collection of works as a artist/curator: sculptures, performances, photography, drawings, projects, paintings, my collection and all that stuff. 

[...] Archives are a form of cultural discipline and it consist of things which refer to some kind of memory.

Often we (cultural worker colleagues and myself) feel the urgency of archiving and the need to hold on to every fleeting moment because somehow, we felt that most things are slipping away. What am i doing with yet another blog. I don't know. Maybe wordpress is prettier than blogspot. So here goes.

[...]

Somebody is better than nobody | Demon-cratic | DC0391

A comic strip by Demon-cratic : Somebody is better than nobody

This comic strip has been going around recently. In light of the GE 2015, this particular strip becomes quite relevant isn't it? Every little discussion I had recently, we do come across this argument that the majority of the people are conservative. Often the notion of freedom, democracy, efficiency is defined so rigidly that only the Singapore version of these tweaked concept works. 

If we are really a conservative bunch, emancipatory processes are also calculated and pre-scripted right. Do we actually believe that Singapore is are waiting for the right balance, the right moment for us to be more liberal and progressive? 

People are more complex than that. Well many things still surprise me. I have lots of faith in the people. 

Nasi padang stall.

via Instagram http://ift.tt/1JaP1vg

Thinking about Jakarta. This Nasi Padang stall is near the place Jen and me stayed while we were visiting Jakarta for the site research. I love this little stalls and home cooked food.

I don' dare to eat much lah... I still have not figured how to say 'is this vegetarian'. 

Story of bishan

I saw this exhibition at Bishan library the other day. I like these little models.

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