SKY KAVE by FERRY

BY FERRY (SINGAPORE)

8–12 May

TUE–WED, 10AM–10PM THU–FRI, 10AM–5PM SAT, 10AM–3PM SAT, 3PM–5PM (RELAXED SESSION, BY REGISTRATION ONLY)

Play Den, The Arts House

MESSAGE FROM THE FESTIVAL DIRECTOR I grew up looking forward to the Singapore Arts Festival every year.

Watching shows across different genres from around the world played a big part in shaping my artistic sensibilities. Shows such as Ninagawa’s Macbeth (1992), for example, entirely changed my perception of how Shakespeare could be performed. In 1996, I acted in Singapore Repertory Theatre’s Sing To The Dawn; it was the first time a Singaporean musical opened the Singapore Arts Festival. Given this history, I was delighted and honoured to be asked to helm the Singapore International Festival of Arts (SIFA) for the next three years.

What is SIFA’s role? Where does it fit in the cultural landscape, both at home and internationally? Who does it serve? Where would I like it to be in three years? As I was thinking of how to shape the festival, what I did know was that I wanted to programme a festival that would inspire young people in the same way that I was impacted 25 years ago.

With the support of the phenomenal team at SIFA, I aspired to curate a season that would showcase different art forms and perspectives from Singapore and around the world. We also strove to programme a spectrum of shows that would appeal to a variety of audiences, from the first-time festival-goer to the seasoned art lover. We believe we have programmed artists who are game-changers in their fields.

In parallel, discussions commenced with several of the game-changers in the Singapore arts scene. One of SIFA’s roles is to commission and facilitate the creation of new Singaporean work – giving artists the time and resources to develop shows over a two- or three-year horizon. We look forward to presenting the culmination of this process in SIFA 2019 and 2020.

Two memorable experiences from arts festivals I have attended around the world have been the free outdoor performances, and a festival ‘village’ — a place where artists and audiences can meet after a show and discuss what they’ve just seen. Both these elements can be found in SIFA 2018. The free outdoor programmes on the opening and closing weekends have some sensational performances to be enjoyed with family and friends. Over these three weeks, The Arts House will become Festival House. It will be the heartbeat of SIFA with performances, lectures, readings, music salons and, of course, a place

to just hang out and chat. Artists will give talks, conduct masterclasses or host Q&As, and hopefully we will build relationships with them that last beyond the festival.

A key initiative that I introduced this year is the $10 front-row student ticket. I want the next generation of Singaporeans to know that they matter to SIFA. My hope is that they will fall in love with the arts in the same way I did at their age.

I would like to thank Sarah Martin and the incredible team of people I work with at SIFA and at Arts House Limited. Despite the tight sixmonth runway to programme this festival, they have been nothing short of amazing and have worked tirelessly to produce a festival that we hope resonates with you as much as it does with us.

Most of all, thank you for your support. The scope, breadth and reach of shows in SIFA will continue to grow over the next three years. We look forward to taking you on this exciting journey with us.

Gaurav Kripalani Festival Director

MESSAGE FROM THE CEO Festivals bring people together to celebrate causes or to mark momentous occasions. Arts festivals allow us to not only appreciate the arts, they allow us to experience and form lasting and transformative memories. It is through shared experiences that we come to form communities.

The inaugural Singapore Festival of Arts began in 1977 as a national showcase of the vibrant art forms found within Singapore’s diverse communities. In its many evolutions over the last four decades, the Festival has touched countless hearts, created invaluable experiences for many, and inspired even more to embrace the arts. From a time when Singapore was widely perceived as a cultural desert, the Festival has played an instrumental role in developing Singapore’s arts landscape and shaped the city-state into one of Asia’s leading cultural capitals.

This year, SIFA 2018 marks the 41st year and kicks off a new era with Gaurav Kripalani at the helm as Festival Director for 2018 – 2020. Condensed into 17 days of artistic adventures, it is our hope that this exhilarating three-week format will create robust artistic engagement for a spectrum of diverse audiences. The Arts House will be transformed into the Festival House, and within its intimate spaces, there will be meaningful discourses on the various themes presented in the festival.

Built upon the foundation and achievements of those who came before, SIFA is the sum of many parts made possible by a team of many talents who has worked tirelessly and passionately to deliver the Festival Director’s vision. I thank everyone who has had a hand in shaping the Singapore International Festival of Arts into a tradition for both new and existing audiences and making it the stalwart of Singapore’s dedication to artistic excellence.

Gaurav and the team have put together a festival of multiple layers allowing you to make up your own artistic adventures. It is my hope that you will walk away with unique memories of the Festival.

Sarah Martin CEO, Arts House Limited

MESSAGE FROM THE CREATOR With a deep desire for creating new and immersive experiences, I first conceived SKY KAVE whilst playing around with the idea of rotating a “live” experience 90 degrees, getting the audience to lie down and the performance is situated on the ceiling instead.

Having become increasingly sensitive to sound vibrations after attending “live” concerts where the venue floor was especially conductive to lower frequencies, feeling the vibrations course through my body as I lay down, gave birth to the idea of using tactile platforms.

The missing piece came after reading an American article about how deaf people “listen” at concerts – through vibrations.

Merging physics and art, this cross-disciplinary work based on cymatics seeks to create awareness between and within the deaf and hearing-centric communities so as to bring forth different perspectives and the sharing of new experiences.

Together with my collaborators Rong Zhao and Kelvin Ang, we hope this sparks new dialogues, ideas and awareness in hopes that more understanding and opportunities are created for all to enjoy the power of sound in its various forms, which includes touch and sight.

Jean Low/FERRY Creator

PROGRAMME NOTES Why just hear sound when one can also feel and see it? This is the premise of SKY KAVE, a music and visual art installation by Singapore multidisciplinary artist FERRY (Jean Low) and technical collaborators, Rong Zhao and Kelvin Ang. The artists have created a suspended projection screen and a “Kave” floor – specially crafted platform chairs equipped with tactile sound transducers—that enables the transmission of sound frequencies into physical vibrations. The platform chairs target different parts of the body with different ranges of frequencies.

Developed around research and interviews conducted with various members of the deaf and hearing-centric community, SKY KAVE isn’t so much about hearing sound and music, rather, by adding touch and sight to the experience, one can discover and experience new ways of enjoying and perceiving it regardless of their sensory abilities.

About the SKY KAVE performance SKY KAVE performances will consist of collaborations between artists from varied backgrounds and disciplines. They are carefully curated multimedia shows involving music, film and projections, set within the space of the Play Den at the Festival House.

A new piece specially commissioned and developed for SKY KAVE, ISSY X EVANTURETIME is a unique collaboration that sees a deaf artist and an aural-centric musician come together to explore their individual perspectives on what sound means to them and how they relate to the sounds around them every day. The post-performance talk will also provide insight into the process of creating this work as well as an opportunity for Issy and Evan to share about their experiences working together and navigating everyday life.

Visit WWW.SKYKAVE.COM for exhibition timings, live performance schedule and more details.

THE ARTISTS

FERRY

RONG ZHAO

FERRY Jean Low, also known as FERRY, has been active in the Singapore music scene since 2007. A seasoned musician, she spends her time teaching, composing, playing in four bands and developing her own solo works both as an artist and as a musician.

What started out as a yearning to stay away from the typical band set up, she has become obsessed with creating, conceptualising and devising new immersive experiences for the audience. Focused on developing good ideas regardless of the art form, this creative producer hopes to develop and grow her vision to showcase music and social issues in a new light whilst involving the community at large especially the disadvantaged.

With a strong emphasis on storytelling, her ideas bring the audience on a journey of discovery, connection, new perspectives and where possible, vulnerability.

RONG ZHAO Rong Zhao is a freelance audio engineer and sound designer. Since 2003, he has engineered, recorded and designed for various projects, from installations to “live� performances to theatre and recordings for orchestras and bands.

His notable forays into interactive and computer music has led him to work on The Canopy (2011) with PerMagnus Lindborg and Joyce Beetuan Koh. The piece was exhibited at the International Computer Music Conference (2011) and World Stage Design (2013).

He hopes to continue the exploration of the unseen world of sound.

ISABELLE LIM

EVAN LOW

ISABELLE LIM/ISSY Isabelle Lim is an aspiring photographer who has a rare condition known as Nager Syndrome. Born with profound deafness, she uses sign language to communicate. She graduated with a Diploma in Fine Arts (Art Photography) from LASALLE College of the Arts in 2016 with the support of the Dare to Dream scholarship and held her first solo exhibition See What I See at the Enabling Village the same year.

In 2017, she held her second exhibition cum fund-raiser for the Today Enable Fund at SPRMRKT, featuring Living with Grace, a photo essay collaborated with her cousin Tham Yin May. You can find out more about Isabelle via her social media platforms. facebook.com/hello.issyshoots | issyshoots.com Instagram: @issyshoots | @hello.issyshoots | @issyshootsinbnw EVAN LOW/EVANTURETIME Evanturetime is the music alias of Singapore producer, Evan Low. The multi-instrumentalist wunderkind makes music and draws inspiration from encountered items – be it an instrument or something more unusual like a tree branch. His talent lies in being able to mash all these sounds into one gooey satisfying pile of auditory narrative that converges and collapses together through analysis, mimicry and tough love.

A Berklee College of Music graduate who majored in electronic production and design, Evanturetime has accomplished plenty in his young career; having produced and performed with artists such as iNCH, Linying and The Sam Willows, to composing for brands such as Adidas, Toyota and Lego, as well as audio engineering for international artists such as David Foster and Nathan East, to name a few. facebook.com/evanturetime | soundcloud.com/evanturetime

KELVIN ANG

KELVIN ANG A stalwart in the local music scene since 2001, Kelvin is well versed as a guitarist playing a unique blend of ambient rock, hip-hop, funk, soul and jazz. He was also the main songwriter and music director for the now defunct nine-piece band, SIXX. To date, he has done tours in New Zealand, Hong Kong, France, China, Japan, Korea, Thailand and Malaysia.

In 2015, after an attempt to build his own studio acoustic furniture, he taught himself to work on wood with traditional hand-tools and has since undertaken commissions for 12 studios and homes, building and installing his line of acoustic panels and diffusers, as well as one-of-akind furniture built with traditional joinery. He has since been featured with UNIQLO, Home & Decor and Square Rooms as a woodworker.

SKY KAVE is his first foray into installation art where he designs and develops wood work for art.

SKY KAVE Origins: Research & Development SKY KAVE highlights the tactile and visual nature of sound, which helps us contemplate about how we listen. Various dialogues and research conducted with members of the deaf community tremendously influenced the development of the platform we are using now.

The initial platform – which was totally flat – only allowed the body to feel a uniform output of vibrations which proved to be limiting as there was no clear differentiation between the various types of vibrations it was trying to convey. So we felt it would be more effective to create a new platform shaped like a lounge chair with hand rests and increase the audio channels and transducers to target different parts of the body with different ranges of frequencies based on existing research about haptic chairs and tactile modality.

By increasing sound isolation, one can feel the differences in the vibrations more clearly, which makes us wonder: “Can this be an effective tool in music education for the deaf? What if music was created based solely on feeling and seeing first rather than hearing?”

SKY KAVE will be continuously developed and made available to anyone interested in expanding ideas and works together in an effort to push this piece beyond its initial phase. We welcome anyone and any communities to get in touch with us and collaborate!

The Creative Team Conceptualised & Conceived by FERRY Audio Technician Rong Zhao Platforms and plates by Kelvin Ang Performers Isabelle Lim, Evan Low

ABOUT SIFA Into its 41st year, Singapore International Festival of Arts 2018 presents diverse and distinctive work from Singapore and around the world that ignites the imagination, inspires myriad audiences, and provokes reflection and dialogue.

Get ready for a plethora of theatre, music, dance, literary and visual arts at the pinnacle national arts festival that will happen over three weeks from 26 April to 12 May, and across ten performance spaces, including the Festival House, located at The Arts House.

ABOUT ARTS HOUSE LIMITED Arts House Limited (AHL) is a not-for-profit organisation committed to enriching lives through the arts.

AHL manages two key landmarks located in the heart of Singapore’s Civic District – The Arts House, a multi-disciplinary arts centre with a focus on literary programming, and the Victoria Theatre & Victoria Concert Hall, a heritage building that is home to the Singapore Symphony Orchestra. It also runs the Goodman Arts Centre and Aliwal Arts Centre, two creative enclaves for artists, arts groups and creative businesses, and performing arts space Drama Centre. AHL presents the Singapore International Festival of Arts, the annual pinnacle celebration of performance and interdisciplinary arts in Singapore commissioned by the National Arts Council.

AHL was set up in 11 Dec 2002 as a company limited by guarantee (CLG) under the National Arts Council and was formerly known as The Old Parliament House Limited. It was officially renamed Arts House Limited on 19 Mar 2014.

AHL BOARD Chairperson: Christine Ong Members: Chong Yuan Chien, Deborah Ho, Kelvin Ang, Lynette Pang, Madeleine Lee, Maniza Jumabhoy, Mok Wei Wei, Ong Chao Choon, Ong Choon Fah, Paul Tan, Sarah Martin (Ex-Officio)

SINGAPORE INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF ARTS THE SIFA TEAM Chief Executive Officer: Sarah Martin Festival Director: Gaurav Kripalani Chief Financial Officer: Yong Yuet Mei Advisor: J P Nathan Head, Programming: Jobina Tan Head, Production: Cindy Yeong Head, Marketing: Jasmine Gan Head, Communications: Carolyn Tay Head, Partnership Development: Payal Michelle Parekhji Assistant Head, Event Services Management: Emma Izzabella Tagoe PROGRAMMING Producers: Sara Joan Fang, Rydwan Anwar, Ye Junmin Senior Manager: Lisa Marie Lip Senior Manager, Place Making: Natalie Tan Managers: Kong Yen Lin, Shridar Mani, Pang Su Li Assistant Manager: Alicia Chong PRODUCTION Production Managers: Christopher Chua, Natalie Lim Production Co-ordinators: Celestine Wong, Melissa Chin Technical Co-ordinators: Huang Xiangbin, David Li Production Assistant: Chong Wee Nee MARKETING Senior Managers: Elizabeth Wong, Winnie Chan Assistant Manager: Koay Yi Ling Senior Designers: Muhammad Hakim bin Rahim, Md Firdaus bin Wari Executives: Diana Othman, Juliana Tan Interns: Clara Janssen, Lim Yi Shuen, Michelle Chia COMMUNICATIONS Assistant Manager: Willy Beh Wei Hong Intern: Rifdi Jaffar TICKETING Executive: Nor Limah binte Ja’ffar PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPMENT Manager: Norita Senin Executive: Tan Yanru EVENT SERVICES MANAGEMENT Frontof-house Hospitality Manager: Dorothy Neo Front-of-House Manager: Mohd Afham bin Abbas Back-of-House Hospitality Manager: Nursheehana binte Akbal Ahmad Event Services Manager: Johnson Kee Secretariat Manager: Carine Lee Transport Manager: Syafiq Zulkepli FINANCE Manager: Vivian Gan Executives: Mandy Choo, Lai Zhi Ying, Priyasini D/O Balachandran HUMAN RESOURCE Manager: Noraliza Ramli Senior Executive: Elaine Neo ADMINISTRATION Manager, Arts: Liza Mustapha Executive: Norhanim binte Mohamed Tayib

TICKET HOLDER PRIVILEGES

FLASH YOUR SIFA 2018 TICKET

TO ENJOY ATTRACTIVE DISCOUNTS & PROMOTIONS HOUSE POUR@FESTIVAL HOUSE

The Arts House, 1 Old Parliament Lane, Singapore 179429

10% off drinks and light bites.

TIMBRE @ THE ARTS HOUSE AND BARBER SHOP BY TIMBRE

The Arts House, #01-04, Annex Building, 1 Old Parliament Lane, Singapore 179429

• • • •

Pizza Set and Twin Half Pints of Archipelago @$31++ Twin Glasses of Red or White Wine @$20++ Twin Pints of Archipelago @ $30++ Pizza Set and Twin Glasses of Wine @ $31++

ESPLANADE MALL

Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, 8 Raffles Avenue, Singapore 039802

1984 and An Enemy of the People ticket holders are entitled up to 15% discount at Esplanade Mall.

Visit www.esplanade.com for more information.

AURA

#05-03 and #06-02, National Gallery Singapore, 1 St. Andrew’s Road, Singapore 178957

15% discount on all food and beverages.

Esplanade Mall

COURTYARD CAFÉ & LOUNGE

Supreme Court Wing, #01-02A/ #01-K1, National Gallery Singapore, 1 St Andrew’s Road, Singapore 178957

10% discount on all food and beverages.

GALLERY & CO

City Hall Wing, #01-17, National Gallery Singapore, 1 St. Andrew’s Road, Singapore 178957

• Free coffee/tea with purchase of any pastries.

• 1-for-1 cocktail, beer, house wine and house spirits all day.

• 10% discount on selected retail items.

SPRMRKT DAILY

41 Robertson Quay, Singapore 238236

10% discount on all food and beverages at SPRMRKT Daily.

SPRMRKT

#02-13/14 Cluny Court, 501 Bukit Timah Rd, Singapore 259760

10% discount on all food and beverages at SPRMRKT.

For more festival deals, please visit sifa.sg Terms & Conditions: Unless otherwise stated, all promotions are valid till 13 May, Sun. Not applicable with other promotions, discounts, vouchers and offers by credit or privilege cards. Ticket stubs presented must be in its original condition. Management reserves the right to amend any promotional terms and conditions without prior notice. Merchants’ terms and conditions apply.

DON'T MISS THESE FREE PROGRAMMES AT THE FESTIVAL

Enjoy a slew of interactive visual arts displays and an elegant jazz concert to round off this year’s enthralling line-up.

BY GEOFF COBHAM AU

26 Apr – 12 May, daily, 10am – 10pm Gallery I, Festival House 26 Apr - 12 May

The Arts House, Level 2 Corridors

With support from Centre 42 Step into this immersive installation and bask FREE in the wonder of light.

BY

SG

26 Apr - 12 May, daily, 10am - 10pm Gallery II, Festival House A multi-dimensional approach to question memory, space and legacy through lapses in structure, text and image.

BY FERRY SG

V I S U A L A R T S

Four Decades

26 Apr–12 May, daily, 10am–10pm 2nd floor corridor, Festival House 10 - 12 May, Thu - Sat , 10am – 5pm Play Festival House Four Den, Decades is an exhibition of ephemera from SIFA from 1977.

Unlock newbeginning dimensions to experiencing sound in this tactile audiovisual installation.

Duke Ellington Orchestra

US

12 May, Sat Shaw Foundation Symphony Stage, Singapore Botanic Gardens

The legendary Duke Ellington Orchestra will play some landmark jazz pieces in a festival closing performance.

For more details, visit sifa.sg.

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