S.E.A. Focus: 4 Unmissable Booths

S.E.A. Focus returns to Singapore 6–15 January. Founders and directors of Gajah Gallery, STPI, de Sarthe, and SILVERLENS introduce alluring works they'll be showing at the fair.

Rita Targui, Director, STPI - Creative Workshop & Gallery, Singapore

Through our presentation, we would like to celebrate four Singaporean artists on an international stage: Adeline Kueh, Jason Lim, Ian Woo, and Zul Mahmod. Regarded as Singapore's next master ceramist, Jason Lim challenged himself to translate motifs found in his three-dimensional works into drawings, and experimented with techniques such as screenprinting and paper pulp sculptures, during his STPI residency.

In his paper sculpture Grain of Sand (Orange) (2021), he defies the planar notions of print and paper, pushing this typically 2D medium into the 3D. Powerfully, this work refers to the imagery of the plastic net that has become a symbol of segregating humans from one another in our present times.

Zul Mahmod, who has been at the forefront of a generation of sound-media artists in Singapore's contemporary art development, has incorporated elements of sound into Spaces Within Time 2.

As a result, this colourful screenprint-on-acrylic work invites playful spatial interaction through the many perspectives effected by the translucent acrylic layers. We are made to be more aware of our bodies in space.

Isa Lorenzo and Rachel Rillo, Directors at SILVERLENS, Manila

Our presentation includes self-portraits by Wawi Navarroza made during periods of transition in the artist's life and practice. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter/The Self-Portraitist (After Alcuáz, Self-Portrait) (2019) is from the artist's 2019 exhibition Self-Portraits and the Tropical Gothic. This was Navarroza's return to self-portraits after her Manila studio was destroyed by fire in 2016.

Portals/Double Portrait (Self-Portrait) (2022) marks her transformation as a mother and a move from Manila to Istanbul, a country that lies in the intersection of ancient and modern cultures.

Pacita Abad had a strong connection with Singapore. She moved to Singapore in 2000 and in 2003 she became the first female artist selected for a three-month residency at the Singapore Tyler Print Institute, where she developed and created 'Circles in My Mind' (2003), her last major body of work. Before her passing in Singapore in 2004, she organised and oversaw the painting of the Alkaff Bridge, now known as the Singapore ArtBridge.

For the first half of the showcase on January 5–9, we will be presenting drawings by Pio Abad from his Notes on Decomposition series, and a painting by Patricia Perez Eustaquio. Self-portraits by Wawi Navarroza and a new tikar (mat) from Yee I-Lann's Tukad Kad Sequence will conclude the presentation on January 10–15.

Pascal de Sarthe, Founder of de Sarthe, Hong Kong

We are showing works by the Vietnamese artist, Richard Streitmatter-Tran who has works in the Singapore Art Museum's permanent collection.

The highlight of our booth will be a large painting, Quiet Mannerisms 2 (2022), that was just completed for the exhibition.

His new series of paintings to be exhibited, titled 'QUIET MANNERISMS' (2022), reflects on physical characteristics and attitudes of Millennials and Gen Z towards work and life balance and the phenomena known widely at 'quiet quitting' or 'laying flat' (躺平) in Chinese.

Faced with shrinking opportunities for prosperity and impending environmental disaster, the youngest generations, as a movement, are rejecting the capitalist productivity culture and are defining their own lives instead.

Jasdeep Sandhu, Founder of Gajah Gallery, Singapore

As the regional art world eases back to normal, we felt that artworks that spoke to people's longing for calm and deep contemplation were important to highlight—works that arguably contrast the loud, glossy atmosphere of pre-pandemic art fairs.

Dr Susie Lingham's series of encased Klein bottles command attention precisely because of their subtle, almost invisible qualities. Their cases have poem-riddles delicately inscribed on them, imploring viewers to walk slowly around the sculptures in order to read them, quietly probing the way the human mind reasons and perceives.

Kayleigh Goh's new paintings, such as To Expand the Horizon in a Confined Room (2022), are a welcome surprise to those who have long been following her work. For the first time, Goh incorporates serene mountainous landscapes within her architectural spaces—capturing the healing, comforting qualities of the distant outdoors against these cold grey structures. —[O]