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SAM’s pilot Residency programme concluded with Present Realms, a fluid project space for the exploration of ideas, works-in-progress and research. The three pilot Residents – Chu Hao Pei, Salty Xi Jie Ng, and Johann Yamin – presented their ongoing inquiries into the themes of intimacy and infrastructure through topics spanning rice, rituals, and gaming. Their practices offer a glimpse into methods, visualities, and beliefs in contemporary worlds that are both familiar and distant.
Chu investigated notions of seed sovereignty and agricultural amnesia across the region, as shaped by political, economic, and social factors.
Ng explored the intersections of grief, rituals, ancestor worship, and Chinese religion, as well as the relationship between museum acquisition and social forms of art.
Yamin focused on histories of eSports and its ecosystem(s) from the vantage of Southeast Asia as a way to consider nationalism, capitalist logics, and queer games communities.
Present Realms reflected the shared and interactive working environment that defines SAM Residencies. This joint presentation extends the Residents’ exchanges during the programme and invites visitors to participate in developing the Residents’ research.
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Activations
Rice Tea Ceremony (activation) | Chu Hao Pei | 15 Jan 2022
To activate his presentation in Present Realms, Chu Hao Pei hosted a Rice Tea Ceremony – a reinterpretation of the traditional tea ceremony that involves the ceremonial preparation and presentation of tea. Chu’s Rice Tea Ceremony invited audiences to take a moment to share their knowledge and memories of rice. Audiences were invited to bring a handful of rice to take part in the ceremony.
Dear Singapore Art Museum Acquisitions Committee (performance) | Salty Xi Jie | 16 Jan 2022
Do relational and social forms of art inherently resist collection by institutions? How are these process-oriented and ephemeral works defined, conserved and valued within the contemporary art institution? Salty Xi Jie Ng presented her ongoing research, based on interviews with Singapore Art Museum’s directors and curators, as well as fellow artists, in the form of a template museum acquisitions agreement. In her lecture, she proposed that SAM collects artist Zarina Muhammad’s recently formalised work on the spiritual and energetic lives of art spaces, titled 9 Questions as Instructions to Construct Pragmatic Prayers for Peculiar Habitats. Zarina’s work presents insights on non-monetary modes of exchange and living, which may also be acquired by a museum. The SAM Acquisitions Committee was cordially invited to attend.
An ornate tunnel to the other side (performance)| Salty Xi Jie | 22 Jan 2022
This performance explored ancestor worship as a means of continuing relationships between the living and the dead, wish-fulfilment on behalf of the deceased and rituals as everyday acts of self-invention.
Everyday Devotion (workshop) | Salty Xi Jie | 22 Jan 2022
While discussing collected responses about Chinese ancestor worship and rituals, you were invited to reflect on lived experience and cultural identity, and imagine new ways of making rituals.
She became my ancestor (talk) | Salty Xi Jie | 22 Jan 2022
Ng discussed her work on Chinese ancestor worship and rituals with writer, artist and anthropologist Jill J. Tan, who researches death and funeral professions.