Issue 15 - Pdf Ctrl+P - CTRL+P: a journal of contemporary art

Joselina cruz
Signs of Wonder
How can I not ask this: isn’t good laughter born from the
“wonder of the event?”That is to say, the event where something is becoming
and which offers us the experience of, as Michael Serres would say, “the immense,
sparkling, holy joy of having to think.” (Lomax, 2000, pxii)
When I was asked to work on the second Singapore Biennale, all the missteps that I had
seen and critiqued regarding the first, as well as the criticisms that surrounded biennales
which I had shored up all these years came rushing to the fore. All the criticisms, especially
that of the biennale being staged together with the International Monetary Fund
meeting, were problems I was determined to resist and desist. The rate of my success in
resistance was dismal.
The circumstances of the curatorial team’s coming together was a highly balanced
decision, with Fumio Nanjo’s continuation as artistic director, being an especially important
key at giving the biennale the necessary steam to forge into the second. Nanjo-san
was the epitome of the regional internationalist, with as many biennales tucked under
his belt as the number of biennales that ran for that year throughout the region. Matthew
Ngui was deeply respected by the Singaporean art community as both artist and curator,
having been part of important international exhibitions (Documenta and Cities on the
Move to name a few); these made him perfect for the post. Finally, I had some curatorial
experience, I was also familiar with Southeast Asia as my specialisation and interest, and
more importantly, I had previously worked in Singapore.
With the Singapore Biennale 2008 (SB2008), I found myself with the opportunity
to work on a new scale, and with more demanding parameters that had to be thought
through more critically and more reflexively. Despite the intense 18 months that we
worked on for the Biennale, the space for reflection is still only, ever, after the fact. The
months before the biennale where marked by a relentless pace that seemed to be at the
heart of the process. I was coiled within a machine wherein days rolled into weeks and
weeks churned out months quickly. It was an appalling luxury to find myself immersed
and sucked into becoming a mere cog of biennale-making. Rupture is a difficult strategy.
And often a strategy that backfires when set within an ossified system. The platform of
a biennale is like that of a gelatinous substance. You see yourself and everyone else in
place, but very few within can move except with labored motions. The biennale structure
allows very few of its proponents the ability for true criticality without sacrificing the
exhibitionary aspect of the enterprise. Despite Marian Pastor-Roces’s extolling Havana’s
interesting position (which positioned itself as the Third World Biennale), Havana is
still located within the confines of the biennale bind (“Crystal Palace Exhibitions” in
Over Here, 2007). Biennales do not seem to have the ability to turn into itself and create
self-reflexive exhibitions that continuously and successfully question the foundation on
which it exists.
Adding a layer to the difficulty of working within biennales is the fact that is Singapore.
Singapore is a city with many troubling aspects underneath its shiny exterior,
transparency being the least of its virtues. The structure of the city is framed strongly by
its government, to quote:
Singapore has constructed a veneer of democracy, development and
freedom that largely insulate it from international criticism. While Singapore
is a parliamentary democracy in name, the effectiveness of its democracy is
undermined by the PAP’s rigorous controls over speech and the press.
It is perhaps because of their economic prosperity that the people of
Singapore do not protest more at their exclusion from the political process.
From a human rights stand point, however, the Western-style prosperity of the
place makes denials of civil and political rights all the more offensive. 1
22 Ctrl+P September 2009