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 … 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. … 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 … 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 … 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 … 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 … 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 … Continue reading SIFA 2024: An Interview with director Haresh Sharma and playwright Chong Tze Chien on Forster-inspired ‘The Prose and the Passion’
SIFA 2024: An Interview with Singapore experimental band The Observatory on exploring darkness and the underground in ‘REFUGE’
The Observatory are not your ordinary band. Going beyond making music alone, the local Singaporean band has been closely involved in art beyond entertainment for two decades, always ready to speak truth to power and constantly using their sound to amplify their thoughts and feelings about social issues, even expanding into the realm of visual … Continue reading SIFA 2024: An Interview with Singapore experimental band The Observatory on exploring darkness and the underground in ‘REFUGE’
SIFA 2024: An Interview with composer Safuan Johari and choreographer Eddie Elliott on collaboration and culture in ‘Suara / Oro Rua’
Left: Eddie Elliott (photo credit: Atamira Dance Company), Right: Safuan Johari (photo credit: A Syadiq) If we put our ears to the Earth and listened, what would we hear? In Suara / Oro Rua, Singapore's Safuan Johari and New Zealand's Eddie Elliott come together in an unexpected cross-country collaboration to imagine the sound of fossilised … Continue reading SIFA 2024: An Interview with composer Safuan Johari and choreographer Eddie Elliott on collaboration and culture in ‘Suara / Oro Rua’
SIFA 2024: An Interview with Lithuanian artists Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė & Lina Lapelytė on beach opera ‘Sun & Sea’
One of the most exciting and outrageous pavilions at the 2019 Venice Biennale came from a rather surprising source - Lithuania, which till then had only occasionally caught the public eye when it came to the art world. When visitors stepped into the Lithuanian pavilion, they entered an entirely different world, one that was dappled … Continue reading SIFA 2024: An Interview with Lithuanian artists Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė & Lina Lapelytė on beach opera ‘Sun & Sea’
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