Annex A: Artwork details and description
Name of
student and
prize awarded
Artwork details & artist’s statement
Artwork image(s)
Koh Chaik Hong The Distanced Land
2015
Photography
Woon Tai Jee Art A series of 5
Prize
(First Prize)
In the name of progress, modernization
demands and justifies the domination of nature
to benefit humankind. In this photography
series, I photograph and observe places that
are or going to be used for urban development
in Singapore. These are mainly in areas of,
Punggol, Sengkang, Tampines and other new
towns.
Is it worth sacrificing the aesthetic experience
of nature for urban development? Nature to me
is a place for escape, beauty and inspiration.
Yet nature has its danger, rough terrains and
dangerous wild animals. Having been
accustomed to the comfort of living in an urban
environment I feel more secure surrounded by
man-made infrastructure. At the same time, I
feel deeply attached to nature. Taking on the
role of an observer, I photograph my subjects
from a distance.
Photographers such as Stephen Shore, Joel
Sternfeld, Andrea Gursky and Alec Soth, have
influenced the way I approach and compose
my subjects. Hopefully through this series, I will
spark a thought in the viewer’s mind on the
dilemma of conserving nature and urban
development.
792121 – The Other Side of my House
2015
Oil paint on canvas
A series of 18
Dimensions variable
Sena Cholin
Lim Ai Fang Art
Prize (Second
Prize)
As I am emphatically concerned with pure
forms and lines, my paintings become
statements about proportion and rhythm. This
series of work depicts lines and colors
combined in a particular way, such that certain
forms and relations of forms stir our aesthetic
emotions.
My paintings share an experience of my life
which has felt incomplete but yet satisfying. I
believe buildings are the symbols of
development. Ever since I was born, my late
father had constantly constructed and
demolished our house. I grew up watching the
interior and exterior of my house transform. I
would like my audience to discover a
sufficiency within the insufficiency, while
appreciating completeness within the
incompleteness of my paintings.
En.Shrine #1, #2 and #3
2015
White Stoneware, Wheel-Thrown and
Assembled, Electric Fired
Leow Wen Jin
Cheong Kam
Hee Art Prize
(Third Prize)
In Shinto, an indigenous religion of Japan, it is
believed that ‘Kami’, the gods worshipped, are
‘hidden’ from this world. Shinto shrines
(archaic: 神社 shinsha, meaning: "place of the
god”) are consecrated structures, sacred for
the purpose of housing gods and spirits of
divinities. Once stripped of the religiosity and
spirits unseen, all we have left are bricks and
stones as relics. Its functionality as a structure
is essentially only founded by the stories we
choose to tell of it.
When an object aesthetically enhances a
space, its function would be said to beautify.
But beauty is fickle, beauty is subjective. What
was considered beautiful then might not
anymore be. So what happens when say, a
highly appraised work of art in this day, is no
longer perceived as beautiful in a century’s
time? Will it then be stripped off of its label of
functionality?
Fiona Seow Hui
Lin
Woon Brothers
Foundation
Commendation
Prizes
1000
2015
Basswood
150 x 25 x 10 cm (entire installation)
This project takes a formalistic approach to art
through the elimination of figures, icons and the
extensive use of colours. With geometry as the
main subject of my research, I aim to explore
perfection while using repetition as the mode of
production. The outcome of the research and
experimentation process results in a series of
three-dimensional wooden sculptures. Taking
on the role as a producer of geometric forms, I
attempt to build the perfect hexagonal cone
with six angled-triangles, every piece a product
of manual labour.
Amanda Soo Li
Xin
Transition I, II and III
Mixed Media on Watercolour Paper
100cm x 150cm
Woon Brothers
Foundation
Commendation
Prizes
Entitled Transition I, the artwork depicts an
entire sketch of a portrait which signifies the
beginning of the art making process before
moving on to Transition II, where 2 figures
begin to take form but are still amidst the
process of settling in the abstract space. Lastly,
in Transition III, the 2 figures complete the
transitory process and display themselves in
full form, while sketches blanket the lower half
of the work to remind the viewers of the
beginnings of the art making process, giving
rise to the notion of a cyclical process.
The artwork done is a study of materials
resulting in a visceral outcome through the use
of paper, boisterous strokes and spontaneous
watermarks. It challenges the public’s
perception towards the notion of completion
and resolution in presented visual works and is
also a reflection of my working methodology.
As artists often have their developmental
sketches hidden from view, the piece hopes to
open up the idea that the fruition of the final
work begins at the first ideation sketch.
Depicting the dynamism of detailed figure
studies contrasted with fully embodied faces
engaging in an opposition to harmonize and
settle in the perceived space, this relates to the
constant, evolving process of an artwork that
requires a reflective channel of feedback
between the outcomes of the art produced and
the implicit desire to resolve what I am trying to
conceive.
As an illustration of the of a “push and pull”
tension, this struggle for achieving resolution in
art making accounts for my identity as an artist.