Arts of Hong Kong: Hong Kong Arts Festival Announces Full Programme Lineup of 53rd HKAF in 2025

HONG KONG – The 53rd Hong Kong Arts Festival (HKAF) is set to take place in February and March 2025, with more than 1,300 outstanding international and local artists in over 125 performances of more than 45 programmes. The Festival Opening performance features the exceptional Orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna under the baton of revered Maestro Donato Renzetti, performing the music of Rossini and Mendelssohn. This … Continue reading Arts of Hong Kong: Hong Kong Arts Festival Announces Full Programme Lineup of 53rd HKAF in 2025

Preview: Singapore Night Festival 2024 – Art of Play

The Singapore Night Festival (SNF) returns to the Bras Basah.Bugis (BBB) precinct for its 15th edition this year, bigger than ever! Happening from 23 August to 7 September 2024, the festival will take place over three weekends for the first time. Organised by the National Heritage Board (NHB), and supported by Lead Sponsor Samsung Singapore, Singapore’s largest nocturnal experience takes festival-goers on a journey to … Continue reading Preview: Singapore Night Festival 2024 – Art of Play

★★★★★ Review: Sun & Sea by Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė & Lina Lapelytė

Intrusive thoughts during a beach holiday at the end of the world. In our modern world of stresses and being constantly online, how much can we say we can truly detach ourselves from work and take a relaxing holiday? For Lithuanian artists Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė and Lina Lapelytė, it seems that any vacation will be bound to be filled with intrusive thoughts, and unexpectedly, … Continue reading ★★★★★ Review: Sun & Sea by Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė & Lina Lapelytė

★★★★☆ Review: REFUGE by The Observatory

Multisensory journey transporting audiences to Perak’s Lenggong Valley, in all its natural and mystical beauty. Modern Singapore rarely leaves much space or opportunity for truly connecting with nature. As much as we tout ourselves as a garden city, green spaces are often integrated into the urban landscape, rather than allowed to simply grow amok, or we lack older geological formations teeming with life. So if … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: REFUGE by The Observatory

★★★☆☆ Review: Wilful Machine by Genevieve Chua

Pondering a future of machine self-awareness, as it reflects on humanity. If machines could talk, what might they say of humans – their makers? Genevieve Chua’s new work Wilful Machine imagines and brings that to life, using a combination of architecture, multimedia and dance, as it premiered at the Singapore International Festival of Arts 2024. Situated at Artspace @ Helutrans at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, audiences … Continue reading ★★★☆☆ Review: Wilful Machine by Genevieve Chua

★★★★☆ Review: Leonardo! A Wonderful Show About A Terrible Monster by Manual Cinema

Demystifying the sorcery of cinema while capturing the magic of puppetry and animation. In a world where kids are almost constantly glued to the screen – how does one keep them entertained in the theatre? By bringing the screen to the stage of course. That is the modus operandi of American company Manual Cinema, who creates films live onstage for their audiences, and in an … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: Leonardo! A Wonderful Show About A Terrible Monster by Manual Cinema

★★★★☆ Review: SUARA / Oro Rua by Safuan Johari and Eddie Elliott

Unearthing the voices of a distant past. Safuan Johari is a musician and composer from Singapore. Eddie Elliott is a dancer and choreographer from New Zealand. While the two artists’ practices seem rather distant, there is a link that makes them surprisingly good collaborators with each other – their shared respect for their own cultural inheritance, and a keen interest in the land we walk … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: SUARA / Oro Rua by Safuan Johari and Eddie Elliott

★★★★☆ Review: The Romeo by Trajal Harrell

Drawing from historical form to imagine a new canon of dance, including everybody and any body. Conceptualised by Trajal Harrell, it’s hard to pin down exactly what The Romeo is. While ostensibly categorised as a dance, The Romeo is also a work that is completely fictional, and expanding beyond mere choreography to imagine a history and legacy. In the space of the theatre where The … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: The Romeo by Trajal Harrell

★★★★☆ Review: Moby Dick by Plexus Polaire (SIFA 2024)

Glimmers of terrible beauty amidst a savage, age-old battle of man versus nature. The beauty of a novel like Moby Dick has always lain in how open to interpretation it is, where everything from the tumult of the sea, to the conversations between crewmates, to the chase for the elusive white whale itself becomes a metaphor for whatever one might be going through in life … Continue reading ★★★★☆ Review: Moby Dick by Plexus Polaire (SIFA 2024)

SIFA 2024: An Interview with director Haresh Sharma and playwright Chong Tze Chien on Forster-inspired ‘The Prose and the Passion’

“Only connect the prose and the passion, and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height.” Such was the way English author E.M. Forster wrote of the importance of using both head and heart in Howard’s End, to connect both critical thought and deep emotion that we can achieve the full potential of humanity itself. Inspired by this quote and … Continue reading SIFA 2024: An Interview with director Haresh Sharma and playwright Chong Tze Chien on Forster-inspired ‘The Prose and the Passion’