From 4 Nov to 5 Dec 2020, Objectifs’ Chapel Gallery converts into an incubation and experimental space that welcomes eight women artists-in-residence for our annual 6th Women in Film & Photography programme.
Here are some highlights from the residency! [Album 1] [Album 2]
Adar Ng is a media artist who works primarily with the medium of photography and video. Her works are based on philosophical queries on reality and its impermanence in the world. She uses the camera as a witness of the absence and presence in other inanimate entities and employs the usage of metaphors in a poetic endeavour to portray temporality and loss. Adar will continue her exploration of these themes during her residency.
She is a graduate from the school of Art, Design & Media, Nanyang Technological University and has since participated in the exhibitions Undescribed #04, Adaptations by Supernormal.sg and CDL Singapore Youth Photographer Award. She was also selected to be in the digital publication of Belgrade Photo Month New Talents 2019.
Amrita Chandradas is a Singaporean documentary photographer. In 2014, she won the top 30 under 30 documentary photographers showcase by Magnum Photos & Ideas tap. Amrita was also a finalist for the Asian Women Photographers showcase, excellence in Digital News by SOPA News, and is a young portfolio finalist for the Invisible Photographer Asia Awards. She graduated with an MA in Photojournalism and Documentary photography from London College of Communications and is a former Angkor Photo Festival workshop alumni (2016).Her work is featured at The New York Times, SONY, National Heritage Board, Timeout Singapore, BBC world, British Journal of Photography, NPR, Financial Times, Dagbladet & among others.
Amrita aspires to explore the intersection of changing environments & its inhabitants. She continues to work on bringing forth the less discussed issues of displacement and struggles through on-the-ground personal insights. During her residency, she will work on two projects – a short film piece commissioned by Objectifs for 2021, together with artists Ruby Jayaseelan and Aarthi Sankar; and ‘Home Away From Home’, a personal photo project that explores growing up as a 5th generation Tamil in Singapore.
Kanchana continues this exploration during her residency, in a video work, ‘The Production of Desire’, looking at assumptions propagated by Indian cinema about desirability of female form, artifices and visual codes of desirability and portrayal of women body as a ‘spectacle’ through the lens of specific songs from the 80’s and 90’s that engaged with the production / performance of desire.
Kanchana received an MA in Fine Arts from LASALLE College of Arts, where she was the recipient of ‘Dr. Winston Oh Travel Research’ award. Since then, her works have featured in numerous group exhibitions, internationally, and she has had three solo shows in Singapore. Her works are in institutional and private collections in Singapore, and in private collections in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Japan, Hong Kong and USA
CONSCIOUS CONNECTIONS
Collaborating Artists: Vivian Lee, Ng Hui Hsien, Gladys Ng, Chloe Chotrani, Shirly Koh
The collaborating artists come from different disciplines, including sound, movement, film and painting. During the residency, they will explore ideas of embodiment and time, especially to notions of stillness and movement.
VIVIAN LEE
Vivian’s social artistry sees her bringing people together for mindful meals and meaningful conversations. An inner gardener, well-being guide and student of the law of Nature, she takes a holistic approach to life and wellness. She enjoys music, movement, creative cooking, journaling and embodied learning. Spreading goodwill and magic stardust whenever she can, she sees a healthy external ecosystem as essential to our inner wellbeing.
Her journey led her to found the Garden of L.E.A.H., a conscious living space in a village in Chiang Mai. There, Vivian holds space to practice mindfulness through gardening, mud house building and community-building. She shares her ethos at gardenofleah.home.blog.Inspired to bring the essence of L.E.A.H. to the city, Vivian co-created Conscious Connections to facilitate reconnections to the natural world through food and mindfulness practices.
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NG HUI HSIEN
Hui Hsien tells stories. As a writer and qualitative researcher, she enters the worlds of others with empathy, to understand their lived experiences and transform these into narratives that inform and engage.
In her photographic art practice, Hui Hsien strives to open up contemplative spaces where people could reflect on themes related to consciousness, (im)materiality and interconnectivity. They are sites where the unconscious can find expression, indirectly or otherwise. Hui Hsien’s photographic work has been internationally exhibited in various institutions and festivals, including a solo show at Reykjavík Museum of Photography (Iceland). Her limited-edition, hand-stitched artist book The Weight of Air is in both public and private collections, and is featured in How We See: Photobooks by Women (10×10 Photobooks, 2018).
Hui Hsien also takes walks in nature, practices meditation and sees paying attention to our bodies as a way to cultivate greater awareness about where we are in this present moment.
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GLADYS NG
Gladys’ films reflect her nature, often nuanced and subtle, interspersed with wry humour. My Father after Dinner, was presented Best Singapore Short at the 26th Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF). Under a commission from SGIFF, she made The Pursuit of a Happy Human Life, that opened the festival in 2016. Her latest work, Under the Same Pink Sky, was awarded Best Directing and Best Editing at the 2020 National Youth Awards.
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CHLOE CHOTRANI
Chloe spent her youth deep in the underground dance scene of Metro Manila, where she found liberation through dancing in communal spaces. Her healing journey brought her to now focus on the sacred movement arts and trauma sensitivity. She has performed professionally in Southeast Asia, Europe, North America, and Australia.
Currently, Chloe is a somatic practitioner with Soma Clinic, where she offers somatic trauma touch therapy. In varied spaces, she facilitates movement classes, ceremonies, and collaborates with other disciplines to experiment and contemplate through playing with space and time. When she’s not dancing, Chloe works at an urban farm giving nature tours and continues to deepen her relationship with the land.
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SHIRLY KOH
Koh Li Qing Shirly is interested in understanding and learning more about her internal world in order to relate and connect better with others in this world. She also has a keen interest in the natural world with the goal to introduce a more evocative perspective and understanding of the everyday mundane.
She graduated from LASALLE College of the Arts with a Bachelor Degree in Fine Art (Honours). She was the recipient of the Chan Davies Art Prize 2016, UOB Painting of the Year 2016 – Emerging Artist – Silver, NOISE Singapore Award 2015 and LASALLE Future Leader Scholarship in 2013.