Miwa Komatsu: Sense Of Sacredness
This weekend is the final chance to catch this numinous retrospective of Japanese artist Miwa Komatsu at Whitestone Gallery, located on the fifth floor of the Tanjong Pagar Distripark, also home to the Singapore Art Museum.
The 39-year-old, who has been described as a yorishiro, or a conduit for divine spirits in Japanese Shinto terminology, is known for her affinity with otherworldly realms. Her works are less individual artistic expression than portals for channelling and communicating visions.
Set in triptychs and mandalas, ferocious guardians from Japanese mythology and folklore populate her canvases, from the dragon-like shinshi of Shinto shrines to wolf spirits that had guided her home as a child in Nagano prefecture, Japan.
For this Whitestone Gallery exhibition, she has created a painting specially for Singapore titled City Amidst Lush Greenery, in which a transfigured, slightly discombobulated Merlion presides over the city’s attendant spirits.
A few obsidian pieces resembling relics point to the artist’s belief that the glossy black volcanic rock harbours connections to the harmony that once existed between humanity and nature.
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Where: Whitestone Gallery, 05-03/06 Tanjong Pagar Distripark, 39 Keppel Road
MRT: Tanjong Pagar
When: Till Dec 17, 11am to 7pm
Admission: Free
Info: str.sg/iYwX
Chinese Seals With A Spin
Chinese seals with “Catch No Ball” engraved on the side or in the shape of Santa on a sleigh are breathing life into the traditional medium.
A total of 54 seal carvings by five Singapore artists – Lee Soon Heng, Tan Chee Lay, Tan Chin Boon, Tang Yip Seng and Toh Chee Hao, who range in age from their 30s to 70s – have been collected at Peace Centre, as part of an exhibition organised by gallery Artualize.
The exhibition aims to show that, beyond seal carving’s functional purpose as signature in the past, it has also evolved to become its own art form.
Artists have carved words and images both at the bottom and at the side of the soap stones, including verses of what the Covid-19 lockdown felt like. These modern seals battle against notions that the medium is specific to China or has become obsolete.
Artualize owner Low Sok Leng says she found that students and those in their 20s have been most impressed with the seals on display, with many drawing connections to modern graphic design modes.
“Why should people care about seal carving? For centuries, seal carvings have been a reflection of the culture of that time. In Singapore, our artists continue to create seal carvings that reflect our unique identity and life here,” Ms Low says.
Where: PlayPan – Play for Good, 01-09/10 Peace Centre, 1 Sophia Road
MRT: Dhoby Ghaut/Little India
When: Till Dec 31, Fridays to Sundays, noon to 7pm
Admission: Free
Spatial Narratives: Lim Jia Qi and Zhang Fu Ming
The use of wood instead of the more conventional paper makes two young Singaporean artists – Lim Jia Qi, 26, and Zhang Fu Ming, 34 – natural bedfellows, reinforced by their having shared a studio and worked alongside each other for years.
Zhang’s stark black-and-white woodblocks carvings serve as noir counterweights to Lim’s more playful and colourful whimsical perspectives of various rooms.
Lim blurs the lines between traditional printmaking and painting by mixing acrylic painting and carving on wood panels. She has some charming watercolour sketches on paper too.
The artists’ split panel joint works – a collage of their distinctive styles – put their differing spatial interpretations in a tete-a-tete.
Where: Art Porters Gallery, 64 Spottiswoode Park Road
MRT: Outram Park
When: Till Jan 3, 10.30am to 7pm, closed Mondays
Admission: Free
Info: artporters.com/exhibitions/
