“Art and love are the same thing: It’s the process of seeing yourself in things that are not you.” ― Chuck Klosterman
The Singapore Art Fair has ended but art still leaves on, especially the ones that left an impression on you. The exhibition celebrates the beauty and serenity that art brings to the world, and also a chance for you to bring them home; albeit some with a hefty price. But what is money upon art, wherein each art piece is unique and priceless? We picked out 6 of our favourites from the Singapore Art Fair that has left a lasting impression on us. Some of the lighting does not do justice to the impeccable art pieces exhibited.
1) Su-En Wong
DH-5 Dolly and Friends (2009) – $40,000
DH-2 Big Tank (2009), $40,000
New York-based artist but born in Singapore, Su-En came under the tutelage of Liu Kang, one of Singapore’s pioneer artists. Her artistic style depicts a very private and deeply personal paradise, exploring conflicting contexts of power and vulnerability, fear and desire, assimilation and individuality. The art utilizes coloured pencil and acrylic on panel as the medium.
2) Sisui Akiba
(from left) Echo of Silence (2014), $3,820, Preparing for the Next Storm (2014), $5,500
Born in Chiba prefecture, Japan, Sisui Akiba graduated from Wako University, Department of Art in 2007. While still at the college, she begun to use a figure standing in a gloomy background as a motif. Her art pieces of oil on canvas perfectly blends a bleak backdrop, while carrying a perplexing serenity within.
3) Manuella Guiragossian
100 Birds, showcasing unique, original birds by acrylic markers, $500
Coming from a family of artists, Manuella’s art pieces displays a splash of colours, impressions of childhood drawings that depict animals and nature. Having studied animation at California Institute of the Arts, she has exemplified a stylistic approach for herself and distancing herself from her renowned father, Paul Guiragossian, through tapping onto childhood inspirations where the imagination is limitless.
4) Yayoi Kusama
A Pumpkin (2014), $340,000
Pumpkin is a powerful motif in Yayoi Kusama’s work. Kusama’s work is based in conceptual art and shows some attributes of feminism, minimalism, surrealism, abstract expressionism, and is infused with autobiographical and psychological content. Calling polka dots “round, soft, colorful, senseless and unknowing […] a way to infinity,” it has become the Japanese artist’s recognizable style.
5) Ahmed Kassim
The Hive, $35,000
Kassim graduated in 2007 from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Helwan University in Cairo. Employing a caricature-like, satirical style in his vibrant paintings, Kassim’s art portrays an iconographic narrative that reads like an unfolding story, albeit unstructured and often chaotic. The above art piece is an artistic view of the bee hive, putting elements of ideologies into oil on canvas.
6) Gavin Rain
Prices unknown
A contemporary South African artist, working primarily in acrylic, and perhaps best known for his neo-pointillist paintings, Gavin Rain took roughly two years to formulate this style. The main purpose was to force viewers to acknowledge that part of the narrative of each painting is “hidden in plain sight,” which explains why you have to see the subject of the painting only by taking a few steps back.
Writer: Leong Chee Sheng