INdulge!
VOL.5 ISSUE 75 • JUNE 17 - 18, 2012
EDGEDAVAO
ARTS & CULTURE
Imagination in a box Lost in Singapore Art Museum
By Neil Bravo
I
had an artwork back in high school where my art teacher commented on. She wrote: “How do you feel like being put in a box?”
At that age, I did not mind its real meaning. Not even the inner meaning behind its real meaning. But when I strayed one This room on the third day into the Singapore level of SAM Garden feaArt Museum, those words tured the work of Justin and yes, my artwork, once Lee entitled “The Art of more flashed before me. Imagination.” Recycled It’s like travelling back in cardboard boxes, ink time. Here I was in front transfer, and acrylic made of hundreds of recycled up the very simple Lee boxes in a boxed up art media. gallery room awed by the The room greets you possibilities. with Lee’s art pieces made of recyclable boxes. More than the artwork is Lee’s message. Large boxes spell out gallery’s theme by the entrance to the room. A few tables were laid out for viewers, mostly family groups where children tinker on the small boxes with their own expression. Two panels of layered large boxes were painted with Chinese characters Xue (which means “Learn”) and Jue (which means “Feel”). Small box-
es were laid on the floor and some were piled on a shelf neatly mounted on the flat white wall. Kids can take the boxes with Justin’s drawings and paint their own drawings or write their own words on them. Justin Lee’s “The Art of Imagination” is an interactive installation with graphics and text painted on recyclable cardboard boxes. This work reflects
how text and images influence and shape our daily thoughts and expressions. In Lee’s gallery, visitors are invited to explore popular local images, texts and motifs, and are encouraged to unleash their own imagination by adding their personal drawings to this creative mashup. They can also replace and rearrange the boxes to create a new message or image.
The artist, Justin Lee, has received awards from the Mont Blanc Artists World Patronage Project (2007), the Philip Morris Singapore Art Awards (2005) as well as the High-
ly Recommended Award in UOB Painting of the Year (2003). Lee is well known for his representations of Singapore society and lifestyle using a unique blend of eastern and western cultural icons. Some of his significant solo exhibitions include “Toy Nation” and “Double HappinessFantasy” in Red in 2003. I felt Lee’s simple but provoking works pick the imaginative brain while you are in front, of all things, boxes. Which takes me back to the question what I will feel if I had been put in a box. If I had been asked the same question all over again, I am more certain this time the answers could fill up a room.
Koronadal
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