DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE

Dear friends,

The next quarter is an exciting time here at the Gallery as we continue to showcase the vibrancy of creative expression in the region. Our new exhibitions in the next few months welcome audiences to engage with innovative artistic practices through the work of artists who challenge traditional art forms and invite different perspectives.

In the Ngee Ann Kongsi Gallery, the exhibition See Me, See You: Early Video Installation of Southeast Asia features five pioneering artists from the region who broke away from the conventions of painting and sculpture to explore the moving image in the 1980s. See these installations in motion, recreated especially for this exhibition.

Head up to the roof to see the 6th Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Commission, Untitled by Shilpa Gupta. The installation lends itself to a host of interpretations: do the bodies locked in struggle embody the antagonism of geopolitical conflict, social tensions within increasingly polarised communities, or the dualities that coexist within us?

Our latest exhibition in the Dalam Southeast Asia space is The Neglected Dimension, opening on 7 July. The exhibition introduces four artists associated with the modernist art movement in Bandung, Indonesia: Ahmad Sadali (1924–1987), A.D. Pirous (b. 1932), Haryadi Suadi (1938–2016) and Arahmaiani (b. 1962), who sought to reinterpret Islamic material traditions and expressions of spirituality.

For more on the art of Southeast Asia, be sure to catch Living Pictures: Photography in Southeast Asia before it closes in August. This landmark exhibition surveys the evolution of photography in the region, from colonial images and studio portraits to contemporary memes and selfies.

Finally, don’t miss your chance to see Liu Kuo-sung: Experimentation as Method, which ends in November. Spanning over 70 years of his artistic career, this retrospective celebrates Liu’s innovative approach to ink painting.

Outside of our exhibition spaces and located across the Gallery, our latest edition of the Gallery Children’s Biennale offers the young and the young-at-heart a space for discovery and play. With the theme “Let’s Make A Better Place,” 11 interactive installations allow young visitors to explore their own thoughts, feelings, motives and desires, and learn more about the world around them.

With a rich variety of things to see and do at the Gallery, we hope you find something that inspires and excites you too.

Eugene Tan Director, National Gallery Singapore

Jean Marie Syjuco. See Me, See You (Revenge of the Giraffe). 1986, environmental components remade 2023. Acrylic paint, gold powder and lacquer on wood, lens, bulbs, sound box, buzzer, books, ink, paper, sintra board, shelves, mirror, vinyl, cathode-ray tube television, video camera, live video feed. Collection of the artist. Image credit: Joseph Nair, Memphis West Pictures.

At See Me, See You: Early Video Installation of Southeast Asia exhibition, Jean Marie Syjuco’s engaging See Me, See You (Revenge of the Giraffe) transforms visitors into voyeurs and performers. By weaving in elements of fun and play, Syjuco invites viewers to explore and participate in the artwork. Surrounded by graphics of giraffes and acacia trees on the walls, viewers may interact in different ways with an abstracted, wooden female giraffe sculpture. If they open the giraffe’s torso by lifting a lid on its back, they may peek at the gestation of its baby. They may also stand on the top step of its platform, which is decorated with a star, or look through the tiny peeper on the giraffe’s nose to see their own feet from the giraffe’s perspective. Viewers may also engage the giraffe in conversation by opening the lid of its head and talking to it.

All the actions and reactions of the viewers are captured on a closed-circuit television (CCTV) camera and livestreamed on a television that is situated in a separate, physical space, for other people to observe from a distance (check it out at the Coleman entrance). The combination of these components alludes to the title of the work.

First exhibited at Pinaglabanan Galleries, Manila in 1986, the original iteration of the artwork used a U-matic video camera. Although the artist distinctly remembers the title of this work as See Me, See You, it is also known by another name, Revenge of the Giraffe . The artwork title for this exhibition brings together both names.