| No other living politician dominates his people and his country like LKY does. Except of course Kim Jong Il and Robert Mugabe. But whereas North Korea and Zimbabwe rank as two of the world’s poorest countries, Singaporeans rank as one of the richest. All in a lifetime. LKY must be doing something right!! For Singaporeans, LKY has always been there and seemingly will be there forever more. But the reality is, even gods pass on.
For our Singapore Survey this year, I wanted to prod Singaporean artists to contemplate a future without LKY. To consider it now and not wait till that dark day. I am certain the machinery of governance are well prepared for that eventuality but are the heartlanders?
I am often asked what exactly is it that an art curator does? First and foremost, we pose questions. Oftentimes these are esoteric questions or even questions of semantics. We asked our favourite artists to consider these questions. We know too that there are no right and wrong answers and that there are many answers and there will be even more questions. For this show, I wanted to invite senior artists like Tang Da Wu, Jimmy Ong and Zai Kuning who live lives LKY would not have approved and would probably consider as failures. None has an HDB apartment to their name. But I also wanted to invite younger artists whose lives have been less defined by LKY and more by new technology. Most of these works are created specifically for the show and we can be sure there will be some very interesting answers forthcoming.
Valentine Willie
Curator
VWFA Singapore
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