A Singaporean art gallery recently featured the work of a man who had previously been known as a Singaporean political dissident and exile. Tan Wah Piow, who has started to turn to art to express his political views, has a body of work on display at the gallery, as well as a feature on his life and history as it relates to Singapore.
When Tan was a student, he took up the cause of a group of shipyard workers and was subsequently arrested. The trial spanned nearly fifty days, which angered the leadership of Singapore at the time, who had anticipated a quick trial. Tan represented himself and was eventually forced to leave Singapore. He lived for a time in England, where he became a lawyer and a vocal critic of government in Singapore. Now, though, Tan has been allowed back, and is using art as his main outlet to comment on the political history of his home country and examine his relationship and life in relation to it.
Much of the art on display at the gallery exhibit can be classified as conceptual. This includes a giant sculpture of a fist made by wrapping and shaping chicken wire, a collection of bottles with colored liquid inside with different branding featuring one of Singapore’s former leaders as the model on the labels. Many of the pieces in the exhibit are plays on words, or literal takes on what Tan views as ongoing injustices against certain people and groups in the region. For example, a broken scale represents justice not being served. A book of law with bullet holes in it represents another piece that criticizes violence and intimidation getting in the way of truth and justice. Other pieces disparage what Tan perceives as the whitewashing of politics and justice in Singapore, including the call for a Malay president to be elected in the country.
Though Tan was never formally trained as an artist, and bears the signs of hard work on his hands in the form of scrapes, scars, calluses, and stains, he said that he accepts the pain and believes he speaks for a number of people who would be otherwise too frightened to share their political views. The exhibit is by appointment only, and the gallery is warning people about the content of the display prior to their visits.
Art is a wonderful way to explore your life, as well as the topics and concerns surrounding it. And now you can enroll in an art class as easily as visiting SGArtClass.com. SGArtClass.com is a website devoted to art, including hosting informative articles on different creative genres, offering discounted art supplies, and organizing a plethora of classes to connect professional art teachers with aspiring art students. Take a class in anything from assemblage art to oil painting and everything in between.
To read more about the exhibit, as well as Tan Wah Piow’s history, go to https://www.theonlinecitizen.com/2017/07/13/the-rebranding-of-the-singaporean-political-dissident-tan-wah-piow/.