Ways of Seeing: A pinhole photography workshop
by Kee Ya Ting and Isabelle Desjeux
Sat–Sun, 27–28 Jul and 4 Aug | Various timings
SAM at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, Level 3, Corporate Office, Main Deck
$22 per ticket | Ages 14 and up

Get acquainted with one of the simplest ways to document your environment: a pinhole camera. Make one of your own using an aluminium can, a light-sealed box and photo paper! Rediscover the world around you with the negatives that you capture: observe how light and shadows interact, how perspectives can be widened and time made to stand still.

In this workshop, this no-lens image-making technique is demystified. Participants will make their own pinhole camera from materials found at home, learn how to expose a shot and experience developing their images in a makeshift darkroom.

Disclaimer 

• This workshop is suitable for participants aged 14 and above. Please note that Singapore Art Museum reserves the right to turn away registrants who do not meet the requirements to participate in this programme.
• Successful registrants will be informed to bring a list of materials to use during the workshop. We seek your cooperation in making this a sustainable programme by reusing materials found from home.
• During the workshop, please be mindful of your surroundings. By participating in this activity, you consent that Singapore Art Museum will not be liable for any injury, loss or damage that you may sustain during this programme.

About Kee Ya Ting

Kee Ya Ting is the pocket rocket powering The Kyt Studio who often zips around on her trusty Lambretta scooter or cooks up weird ideas with other creative collaborators. An artist, photographer and video producer, Kee revels in projects where she can mesh her formal art sensibilities with an edgy commercial perspective. Her photographic works have been shown in the Singapore International Photography Festival (SIPF), the Dali International Photography Festival and the M1 Fringe Festival. Her most recent solo exhibition in 2022, Monday Mornings, I Whispered, explored scenes of Singapore’s wilderness through encaustic photographs. 

About Isabelle Desjeux

Isabelle Desjeux is a Singapore-based artist and researcher. Using her training in Molecular Biology and by working closely with scientists, she creates works based on the scientific method. She encourages participants to assume the perspective of a scientist in her interventions, whether they are in a class, a workshop or experiencing an installation. Camera obscura and pinhole photography have been a prominent part of her practice and teaching since 2014. Most excitingly, this has led to projects such as Pinhole in Lengkok Bahru for Arts in the Neighbourhood (2020) , and Kota Foto: Pinhole in the Neighbourhood (2021) , where a (walk in) pinhole truck travelled around the Pasir Ris neighbourhood. She uses pinhole photography not so much to produce pretty pictures, but to see.

Sekali Theia: An audio experience by bani haykal and ila 
Sat, 27 Jul and 3 Aug | 7–8pm  
Meet at Tanglin Halt Market 
$10 (refundable, T&Cs apply) 

Sekali Theia is a sprawling audio experience that responds to Sookoon Ang’s public art commission, Moonlight. Taking inspiration from the emptied flats of Tanglin Halt and the ghost tracks that run down the Rail Corridor, Sekali Theia explores how different layers of time and space can occur simultaneously and transform the bodies that pass through them.

The audio experience begins with a self-guided walk and ends with a live performance. It is an invitation to listen deeply and be attuned to the fragments of a place, each one displaced or emplaced over time and preceded by the hypothesised collision of Planet Theia into proto-Earth. This single cosmic event, which birthed the moon, seasons and tides, has rippling echoes that continue to unfurl in all matter—environments, flora and fauna—through endless cycles of creation and destruction.

ila and bani haykal will be performing solo live sets on 27 July and 3 August respectively.

Disclaimer

• To secure your registration, a $10.00 charge will be implemented per session. This amount will be refunded through Peatix upon your arrival and successful attendance of the programme session(s). Please note that if a participant misses the programme without prior notification via Peatix Messenger to The Everyday Museum, this deposit will be forfeited. We seek your understanding in this matter.
• For sanitary purposes, please bring along your personal earphones for the self-guided walk portion of this programme.
• The performance will be delayed by a maximum of 15 minutes in view of inclement weather. We seek your understanding that the performance may be cancelled beyond the 15 minutes delay if weather is still unfavourable.

About ila 

ila is a visual and performance artist whose intimate works incorporate archives, moving images and live performance. Her works reconfigure and merge speculative fiction with factual histories, informal archives and collective experiences, conceiving them as sites for empathy and connection. ila’s works have been included in group shows such as Singapore Biennale 2022 named Natasha; Proposals for Novel Ways of Being, National Gallery Singapore (2020); 2219: Futures Imagined, ArtScience Museum (2019) and Arus Balik: From below the wind to above the wind and back again, NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore (2019).  She has also exhibited at the National Design Centre (2019); Coda Culture, Singapore (2018); Objectifs – Centre for Photography & Film (2016); Ketemu Project Space, Bali (2016) and Unifiedfield, Granada (2015), among other spaces. 

About bani haykal

bani haykal experiments with text and music. As an artist and musician, his work revolves around human-machine relationships and intimacies as well as examining and reflecting on how tools and technologies have shaped and continue to shape our experiences as we navigate places and people. Manifestations of his research include site-responsive installations, poetry and performance. bani has participated in festivals including Other Futures (The Netherlands), MeCA Festival (Japan), Wiener Festwochen (Austria), Media/Art Kitchen (Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia and Japan) and Liquid Architecture (Australia/Singapore), among others. 

Under the Banyan: A storyteller responds
by Kamini Ramachandran with Syafiq Halid and Joseph Nair
Sun, 28 Jul and 4 Aug | 11am–12pm 
SAM at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, Level 3, Corporate Office, Main Deck 
Free with registration 

In Malay folklore, the banyan tree is a gateway into other realms and an important source of Indigenous knowledge in contemporary urban life. Inspired by Shooshie Sulaiman’s Kancil Mengadap Beringin and informed by a visit to the Southern Islands where the artwork is sited, oral tradition practitioner Kamini Ramachandran presents a lecture-performance that weaves her personal stories with extracts from the artist’s storybook, which accompanies the artwork. Joined by sound artist Syafiq Halid, with contributions by photographer Joseph Nair, Under the Banyan is an intimate, multi-sensorial experience that uncovers our metaphorical and spiritual connections to the banyan tree as a mediator of worlds, mother of the forest and the tree of life.

This programme is free with registration. Limited seats are available.

About Kamini Ramachandran 

Growing up amidst vast plantations in Malaysia, Kamini Ramachandran shares a similar childhood background with Shooshie Sulaiman, as well as the same concerns about the transmission of oral traditions and values passed down through folklore. Kamini founded MoonShadow Stories, a storytelling entity that promotes oral traditions, which held its first performance at the Substation, coincidentally where the banyan tree featured in Kancil Mengadap Beringin was nurtured as a sapling.

Wild Neighbours: Film screening and conversation with Divaagar, Jun Chong and Melody Wu 
Fri, 2 Aug | 7–8.30pm  
SAM at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, Level 3, Corporate Office, Main Deck 
Free with registration 

Since April 2023, Divaagar’s Everfowl Estate has been on view at Block 1 Everton Park as part of The Everyday Museum’s public art commissioning series, Port/raits of Tanjong Pagar. This artwork playfully proposes a civilised living environment for the junglefowl that roam around the neighbourhood and suggests the possibility of harmonious living with our nonhuman counterparts. Everfowl Estate examines how city inhabitants engage with public spaces and highlights the urban ecosystems that exist amidst and are affected by constant urban development. Joined by filmmaker Jun Chong, the director of《新民》New Resident, and avian specialist and researcher Melody Wu, this programme invites contemplation on the nuanced dynamics between humans and nature as well as art, science and habitat.

The evening includes a screening of《新民》New Resident, a narrative short film by Chong that spotlights the unlikely relationship between a resident and the wild chickens found at her estate in Sin Ming.

About Divaagar

Divaagar is a visual artist who creates installations, performances, and digital media. His practice examines narratives and proposes new models by rethinking how bodies, identities and environments interact. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (First Class Honours) in Fine Arts from LASALLE College of the Arts in 2018 and has exhibited both locally and internationally since 2010. He has had two solo presentations thus far: Between a rock and a hard place, part of a summer residency in Untitled Space, Shanghai and The Soul Lounge at soft/WALL/studs, Singapore. Notable group exhibitions include MENTAL: Colours of Wellbeing, ArtScience Museum; State of Motion 2021: [Alternate / Opt] Realities, Marina One, and Time Passes, Singapore Art Museum.

About Jun Chong

Jun Chong is a Singapore filmmaker and producer who is interested in stories that people can connect to deeply. His debut short film 《客》premiered at the Busan International Film Festival in 2017 and clinched the “Best Asian Short Film” and “Best Actress” awards at the Sapporo Short Fest in 2018. Chong’s 《新民》New Resident premiered in international film festivals in Taiwan, Thailand and Dubai. His most recent work, Siti, clinched the top prizes in Cine65 2021, including the prestigious “Movie Makers Award,” “Best Film,” “Best Screenplay” and “Best Cinematography.” Chong is an alumnus of the prestigious Asian Film Academy in Busan International Film Festival 2017.

About Melody Wu

Melody Wu has a keen interest in using genomics techniques to study evolutionary biology and biogeography. Wu studied the population genomics of Red Junglefowl (Gallus gallus) populations in Singapore using whole genome resequencing data for her BA Honours thesis. She is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Basel, Switzerland.