Back to mother
2014 - Drawing & Print (Drawing & Print)
Zai Kuning
Concerned with the early history of Singapore, Zai Kuning spent many years living with and researching the history of the Riau peoples who were the first inhabitants of Singapore. Inspired by the women of Riau, Back to Mother seemingly traces the central role of maternal figures in nourishing of Riau’s history as an early archipelago kingdom that was Hindu, Buddhist, and animist prior to 14th-century Muslim invasion. Organic materials such as beeswax form a layer of balm protecting threads of red paint symbolic bloodlines in a turtle-formed mandala—a primordial womb that recalls the Hindu and animistic origin of Singaporean society.
Zai Kuning is one of Singapore’s leading avant-garde practitioners. He refuses to categorize his work, and his output crosses multiple disciplines including painting, drawing, sculpture, installation, film and video, experimental sound, and performance. His practice often examines the concept of the “tortured body,” and many of his pieces explore the relationship between somatic experiences and language. He founded the Metabolic Theater Laboratory (MTL) in 1996 to examine the relationship between physical movements and language in Southeast Asian rituals. After disbanding the MTL in 2001, he returned to individually defined practices such as solo performance, writing, sound, and research. His most recent work responds to histories of indigenous people in Singapore and Indonesia including the Orang Laut and Dapunta Hyang Jayenasa.
Colors:
Other related works, blended automatically
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Zai Kuning
2014Justice (2014) presents viewers with a curious assemblage: a wooden gallows with slightly curved spindles protruding from the topmost plank, which in turn is covered with rudimentary netting, the threads slackly dangling like a loose spider’s web or an rib cage that’s been cracked open...
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Chadwick Rantanen
2010Telescopic Pole is an adjustable telescopic pole that extends vertically from floor to ceiling and is held up by its own internal pressure...
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Alexandre da Cunha
2005His Deck Painting I recalls the simplistic stripes of conceptual artist Daniel Buren, or the minimal lines of twentieth century abstract painting, but is in reality a readymade, fashioned from repurposed fabric of deck chairs...
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Federico Herrero
2009Federico Herrero’s energetic paintings reflect his experiences on the streets of his native San José, Costa Rica, and in the surrounding tropical landscape...
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Kwan Sheung Chi
2007A Flags-Raising-Lowering Ceremony at my home’s cloths drying rack (2007) was realized in the year of the 10th anniversary of the establishment of The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China...
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Bruce Conner
1995Bruce Conner is best known for his experimental films, but throughout his career he also worked with pen, ink, and paper to create drawings ranging from psychedelic patterns to repetitious inkblot compositions...
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Firenze Lai
2013Central Station, Alignment, and Sumo are “situation portraits” that present whimsical characters within distorted and troubling worlds...
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Ho Tzu Nyen
2011The Cloud of Unknowing (2011) is titled after a 14th-century medieval treatise on faith, in which “the cloud of unknowing” that stands between the aspirant and God can only be evoked by the senses, rather than the rational mind...
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Edward Kienholz
1984Untitled (San Francisco) was made in Idaho in 1984 and was facetiously dedicated to Henry Hopkins, the then director of the San Francisco Museum of Art who added “modern” to its name...
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Yoan Capote
2007Open Mind is a model created by Capote for a traversable public maze that, when seen from above, resembles the human brain...
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Alicia McCarthy
2010A painting reminiscent of a certain “naive primitivism,” Untitled (the way in is the way out) is representative of McCarthy’s work...
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Alexandre da Cunha
2011The series West (Flag 1), West (Flag 3), and West (Flag 6) continues da Cunha’s ongoing exploration of the form’s various vertical, horizontal, and diagonal stripes...
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Alexis Smith
1995In 8 Ball Surfboard (1995),Alexis Smith combines her long-term interests in California culture and conceptual assemblage...
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Scott Reeder
2013Reeder’s works often start with language—and his Pasta Paintings are no different...
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Kori Newkirk
2013LAB (2013) conjures the body as the trace of a sooty hand appears, spectrally, on a crumpled paper towel...