Ng Joon Kiat, Surgery, Zombie Abstraction and Covid Series 3, 2020, surgery instruments, wood, acrylic on linen, 45 x 55 x 25 cm. Image courtesy the Artist.

The Not Singapore Project: Migration to the Internet Country and the Portable Identity by Ng Joon Kiat is the artist’s first solo exhibition with the gallery. Working with the material language of paint as thought and conceptual processes, Ng constantly strives to liberate his mediums and aesthetics. This new body of work that he has developed in recent years, marks an exciting trajectory in his practice while he continues to dismantle the confines of geographical boundaries and identity politics. Conveying a deliberately brusque humour, the exhibition sees Ng explore watercolours as a means to shape a new identity and search for alternative spaces in his practice. He puts forth the notion of the nomadic citizen, where travel and the Internet form critical resources to seek meaningful connections and comfort beyond where one comes from. Here, hazy landscapes overlap with impressions of news headlines and screengrabs; surgical tools affix to rough edges of paintings; loose pages of watercolour sketches spill out of a white frame; and scrolls of seascapes tucked away in wooden boxes reveal his multifaceted and non-conformist approach to materiality. The Not Singapore Project: Migration to the Internet Country and the Portable Identity is a highly idiosyncratic and introspective consideration of what contemporary painting could be and do for the artist—and perhaps us too—beyond place, time, social structures, and whatnot.

Venue: Yeo Workshop, 47 Malan Road, #01-25 Gillman Barracks, Singapore 109444

When: 18 May - 16 Jun 2024,

By: Yeo Workshop