BEHIND THE SCENES: COLLAB & CONQUER, AN MCCY X KULT ESCAPE ROOM EXPERIENCE

We were approached by MCCY’s digital agency, Tribal, to create and conceptualise an immersive experience that encourages collaboration between people of all walks of life, with elements of arts & culture.

We started off thinking about an engaging community installation that could involve everyone and anyone.

DRAWING BOARD_v1

One of the many initial ideas was the ‘Mobike’ Banksy, inspired by memes of bikes being found in various states of duress. There’s a vandal in town and he’s creating visual sculptures using Mobikes. Your role is to get to the bottom of the issue; is he just a crook or simply creating conversations that Singapore needs? The Mobike Banksy is the hero we don’t deserve, creating calm out of the chaos with an underlying social commentary of society.

DRAWING BOARD_v2

At this point, the brief changed and we were tasked to conceptualise an Escape Room experience. It took a month of proposals before we got everything locked down and ready for production.

Turns out, conceptualising an Escape Room isn’t as simple as it sounds. Besides creating an inclusive yet compelling storyline, every clue had to make sense to the story, be revealed in shocking (yet suitable for the faint-hearted) ways, and be relatively low maintenance for up to 12 games played a day.

Instead of booking out all the Escape Rooms in Singapore in the name of Market Research, we locked ourselves in the gallery, role-played, and didn’t let ourselves out till we cracked the code.

Surprisingly, only 29 pints of beer were massacred during the month long process along with 1 Britney moment.

We finally came up with the idea of Kult Museum - housing art from all over the world in a truck that moves around Singapore. The premise? Chris Chai’s artwork has been stolen, and it’s up to you to find it through a series of cryptic clues and tech elements.

Launch video by Tribal.

LOOK & FEEL

We wanted to communicate the idea of being different, yet coexisting harmoniously. No matter who we are or where we come from, we’re all just human beings, innit? Running with that idea, we took the diverse artwork of various styles and colours housed within Kult Museum and put them together as paper tears hiding beneath a larger mnemonic device.

THE MMNEMONIC DEVICE.

*$10 to anyone who can pronounce ‘mmnemonic device’ correctly on your first try.*

When you’ve solved the Escape Room mystery, a booming voice laments: It's amazing what you can achieve when you keep your eyes wide open and biases at bay. Always strive to see the beauty in everything and everyone.

This is accompanied by some seriously skkkurry eyeball projections on the ground.

The Grand Reveal, that’s usually accompanied by screaming.

Artwork by Shang Liang and animated by Nia Syazwani.

Well, that explains the eye motif. We’ve kept that as a consistent mnemonic device to remind ourselves, and everyone else of the moral of the mystery, and why we started this in the first place.

There you go, that’s the story of the look and feel. Everything else came easily after this through adaptations for the truck facade, digital screens, social media banners…

A TRUCK WAS BORN

After a month of production work, we couldn’t help but get emotional when the truck first drove in.

Tears were shed.

We quickly got everything built for the interior, with the help of our homies at Unicom Marketing.

*Write-up in the Escape Room that kept the fantasy alive.*

Slowly, everything was coming together really quickly and we were ready for our rounds of experimental testing.

Over 2 weeks, friends and family were invited to participate in gameplay and give us user experience feedback before it opened to public. Changes were made, egos were slightly bruised, but we were ready for the media preview and public launch on 26 January.

A MONTH OF BLISSFUL ENTRAPMENT

Between 26 January - 17 February, the Escape Room truck roved from Plaza Singapura, to Raffles City, Hillion Mall and Our Tampines Hub and the team followed for late night move-ins and daytime shenanigans in the sweltering heat.

On weekends, we ran some really cool fringe activities with the help of Eugene Soh of Dude SG, Kapi and Darryl of The Department, and our favourite Indonesian, Ravi Manthovani.

These fringe games were complementary to the Escape Room. In the Escape Room, you find out where Chris Chai’s painting has gone, while you find out who stole it in the fringe activities.

Spoiler alert. Chris did it.

First up, a motion reactive game. 4 people are required to run on the spot, which activates an animation on-screen of the thief bobbin up and down in a crowd of people. After about 15 seconds of running, 1 suspect is revealed.

Catch him if you can.

Second in line is an app-based game similar to Where’s Waldo. You are presented with 4 characters that you’ve to find on the crowded screen filled with strikingly similar characters. Once you’ve found them all, another suspect is revealed.

Keep your eyes peeled.

Next, a web based game that requires exactly 4 people playing at once. Scan a QR code and you’ll be led to play a memory card game. Each player has one portion of a bigger puzzle piece and once everyone has completed their part, the last suspect is revealed.

Remember, remember, the fifth of November.

At this point you have 3 suspects and their character descriptions at hand. Using all the information you have, you’re required to play an image matching game to form the face of who you think stole the painting. If you guessed Chris Chai, you win.

KULT MUSEUM ARTWORK

We had artwork from all around the world housed in the Escape Room.

Existing artwork from Reza Hasni (SG), Ashton Lim (SG), Joseph Chiang (SG), Bart Bros (PH), Deepika Das (SG), Tind Silkscreen (GR) and A1one (IR).

We had some new artwork created by Didier “Jaba” Matthieu (BE) , Nia Syazwani (SG), Ravi Manthovani (ID) and Deborah Emmanuel (SG).

A look at all the artwork featured.

BONUS CONTENT

For everyone who made it till the end, here are some videos Tribal got produced to promote the campaign.

Boss man, Raja, on collaboration.

Influenza marketing.

Walkthrough of the experience.

SAW + SAM CLOSING

Over the past two months, we found ourselves spending an incredible lot of time at the Singapore Art Museum’s 8Q building. During the Singapore Art Week, we blasted open some wormholes a la Rick and Morty. Then a few weeks later we threw a farewell party for the museum building, which was set to close for renovation works for a few years. It’s been a wild start to our year, and we’re here with a recap for you.

SINGAPORE ART WEEK

Contrary to popular belief, interdimensional travel doesn’t just arise out of following Rick’s portal gun formula. Lots more work went on behind the scenes.

We wanted to highlight the value of art as experiences, as opposed to their usual status as museum artefacts. With this in mind, we felt that an immersive and interactive approach would be most important.

And so we thought of using Rick and Morty’s intergalactic portals as a starting point because, well, who wouldn’t want to step into one of these things? The art that Kult often brings to a formal museum space could be construed as almost from alternate universes.

For this event, we went the extra light-mile. We brought together artists and creative collectives to present not just one, but three portals: Emoji Land, the Isle of Good Deeds, and the Garden of Internet Delights. These worlds offered outworldly experiences visually while presenting tasks that enhance skills, broaden perspectives and offer insights that can be applied back on Earth.

The concept for Emoji Land grew out of Howie Kim’s surreal emoji collages, as well as our fascination with the idea of a life-sized board game that visitors could play with.

Howie Kim with his Emoji-based digital artwork.

One of our references for a life-sized board game (Image found in the depths of the Internet).

We commissioned Howie to bring Emoji Land to life. We also paired him up with Dude Studios to create augmented reality (AR) content that could be activated through scanning a QR code. Together, they created a life-sized Emoji Castle and a set of digital face masks.

Isle of Good Deeds is a space where a visitor’s task is incomplete until they have performed a good deed. We invited our long-time collaborator Ravi Manthovani to work with us for this, and once again also brought in Dude Studios. Using climate change as the context, we conceptualised a red-tinged world where the earth is overheated. If visitors generate wind into the microphones using the folded fans provided or any other means, the visuals on the projected artwork gradually turn into a calming blue colour.

Installation view of the Isle of Good Deeds.

The third portal opened up into the Garden of Internet Delights, a world whose name is derived from a digital artwork by Zxerokool. We asked Zxerokool if we could bring new life to his work by animating it, and then worked together with Ravi Manthovani to make it happen. The final piece was projected onto a screen to set the tone of the entire portal.

Zxerokool’s ‘The Garden of Internet Delights’.

Against the backdrop of this projection, we invited a young theatre collective, Patch and Punnet, to stage an interactive theatre piece inspired by the whims and implications of living inside of the Internet. Complete with characters playing Instagram, Mr. Internet and Virus, the collective offered animated perspectives about the Internet to the forefront.

Installation view of The Garden of Internet Delights, with theatre group Patch and Punnet posing in front of Zxerokool’s digital artwork.

We devised a flow to the entire experience, with a set-up at 8Q Plaza introducing visitors to all three worlds. A large directional signage – created as a collage of Emoji Land, Isle of Good Deeds and the Garden of Internet Delights. Scanning the QR codes on our signage reveal animations, sound clips and hints to the adventures that await inside the portals.

MAD FOR SAM PARTY

A few weeks later we came back to the SAM @ 8Q building to throw a super badass Mad for SAM Party over the weekend of 16-17 February. This time, instead of just three rooms, we had the entire building to fill up. We brought in deconstructed graffiti, interactive theatre and projections, and far more.

The idea behind this was to show the energy of super young, youthful and new talent – in a way to have audiences already anticipating the return of a refurbished SAM, as well as hungry for more from the Singapore arts and culture scene. While we were only at SAM for a day during Singapore Art Week, this MAD Party happened over a span of three days.

We were inspired by the art direction of single-room experiences – music video style. We wanted to let creatives dress an assigned room according to their own visions and personalities, thus each representing a fragment of our subcultures.

Here is the brief that we gave to our creatives:

And who were our chosen ones? We gathered artists to represent various subcultures and advancements within their own artistic practices. Since many of them worked fluidly across mediums and fields, we believed that they would be able to defy the labels surrounding their subcultures.

Nicholas Leong and Teo Chong Wah were, to us, representative of the street and urban art scene. They created an installation titled “It Is What It Is”, which abstracted the forms of graffiti and connected that to everyday experiences.

Visitors standing in front of a projection in Nicholas Quek and Chong Wah’s ‘It Is What It Is’.

We also got on board Sproud, a creative agency specialising in immersive video production. They presented “The B-Side”, which inquired into Singapore’s history through reimagining the legend of William Farquhar – a British Major General who claimed to have founded modern Singapore. They made use of holograms and a motion-sensitive voting system to question conventional notions of history and subvert conventional notions of how voting choices are meant to be confidential.

Installation view of Sproud’s MAD History: The B-Side.

While Christopher Sim is not a musician, we saw him as representative of the Youth and Urban Music subculture because of how he documents their events and experiences through photography. Chris assembled together a room of music, zines and a flea market, and even brought in live sets by eight local bands: Sobs, Cosmic Child, Subsonic Eye, Live the Empire, Forests, susurrus, Terrible People and Xingfoo&Roy. Fun fact: this is the first time that live music has been played in the SAM @ 8Q building since its opening in 1996.

A zine library by Squelchzines, set up as part of Christopher Sim’s ‘Music Frenetic’.

Audiences jamming out at Christopher Sim’s ‘Music Frenetic’.

Haikel represents an emerging group of artists interested in the new media art field. He wove augmented reality and sound-reactive kinetic technology together with typography and words to create interactive experiences that explore the future of digital communication.

Visitors experimenting with augmented reality face filters as part of Haikel’s DIGIType.

For the fine arts scene, we selected JOE. an anonymous duo who satirise their own practice. They created an installation inspired by the components of the human brain, compelling audiences to reflect upon how they engage with their environment.

Visitors interacting with part of an installation in JOE.’s ‘ I’m just an average Joe, babe’.

Patch & Punnet, which also featured during the Singapore Art Week, presented an adaptation of their original play ‘Stupid Cupid’. It aims to de-stigmatize notions of failure through an immersive theatre experience.

An actor standing in front of an archway, as part of Patch and Punnet’s interactive theatre experience, ‘Cupid’s Theatre’.

A Sign of the Times - From the Streets of Singapore

A Sign of the Times - From the Streets of Singapore, which exhibited as part of the Aliwal Urban Art Festival on 19 January 2019, brought together the works of over 40 creatives as - one might consider it so - proof of our thriving urban art scene.

This is the second volume of Kult’s From the Streets, a series of country-specific exhibitions. If ya remember, the first volume Pusakal happened in 2017 where we brought in graffiti and urban art from Manila, Visayas and Mindanao in the Philippines. This time, we shine our spotlight back on homeground, focusing on the urban community’s response to living in a state where rebellion is punishable by law.

We reached out to creatives with instructional signages that we often see on the streets. Alongside the metal street signs that we picked for their negative tone, we gave a short brief to our artists: to respond to living in a state that tells us what we cannot do.

On our part, we saw this as both an opportunity to highlight Singapore’s creative individuality as well as a social experiment. What would members of the urban community produce within the boundaries of our brief and medium? How would creators use this platform - to self-censor, or throw messages back out on the streets?

The artists, designers, performers, and new media artists who we handpicked all came through.

What d’ya think about a no-dab zone? Race Krehel created this piece titled ‘Clout Free Zone’. While keeping to the visual language of street signs, it brought in a slice of viral popular culture.

Kilas’ piece ‘Die or Skate’ draws very much from his distinctive art style - the instructional sign feels as if it has been completely, triumphantly, reclaimed by the streets.

Denise Yap brought a political edge to her ‘Only Straight’ sign, commenting on a topic that has been in heated public discussion recently.

During Aliwal Urban Art Festival, we mounted these signs and put ‘em up, guerilla style, in the car-park adjacent to Aliwal Arts Centre. Some were mounted on metal poles, while other works were displayed in a way that echoed their contents: for example, we acquired an O-bike on which we displayed Trase One’s O-Bike piece.

Visitors looking at Trase One’s piece, which is mounted onto an O-Bike.

The theme of this year’s Aliwal Urban Art Festival was ‘On the Edge’, which echoed our exhibition’s themes perfectly. Given strict laws, street art is often perceived to be such a risky act. Yet here our urban street community stands strong on the edge, thriving vibrantly and with pride.

Exhibition view of ‘A Sign of the Times’.

Visitors posing with street signs by @syamimon and @adelia.lim.

A young visitor inspecting @clarrot’s street sign.

@lifeofapotatodancer adding final touches to her work.

ASIA’S FIRST VR GRAFFITI BATTLE @ CULTURE CARTEL CON.

We’ve been obsessed with the idea of art existing in the digital space - not just social media, but something sexier, using cool new disruptive technology. After researching the digital space in Asia (especially in the context of the upcoming Culture Cartel convention), we devised a way to present an elevated language of street art in Singapore - by marrying Graffiti with Virtual Reality.

The concept of the VR Tilt Brush Graffiti Battle was born, and Singapore’s first ever street convention, Culture Cartel, was an appropriate stage for that.

Two things happened. Lets get to the basics.

SIN CITY

We live in a country where rules are everywhere and we’re constantly told what not to do, very often in the form of street signs. We procured some Singapore-special street signs and sent them to 13 artists to wreak havoc all over them. The results tingled our irreverent selves to the bone. These went up for sale at our booth. A larger (and improved) street sign showcase will be presented at Aliwal Urban Arts Festival on 19 Jan 2019.

Die or Skate by Kilas (SG) — *Die or Skate* by Kilas (SG)

Cock-blocker by Keith Ang / Spazak (SG) — *Cock-blocker* by Keith Ang / Spazak (SG)

SiaLan (Cocky) by Winnie Tan (SG) — *SiaLan (Cocky)* by Winnie Tan (SG)

VR GRAFFITI BATTLE

On theme with the overarching idea of living in “Sin City”, we selected eight kickass graffiti artists to participate in Asia’s first-ever VR Graffiti Battle. These peeps expressed much interest in momentarily ditching their spray cans for joystick controllers.

The graffiti artists, NESTWO, DIDIER ‘JABA’ MATHIEU, BOON BAKED, CLOG TWO, KATUN, INKTEN, CLOAKWORK and HAS J experienced training with the Tilt Brush over two weeks and unsurprisingly, they took to it like fish to water.

Kult has, and always will be an incubation space for artists. With digital graffiti, we hoped that a little training and practice would fuel something different in their journey as artists and boy, were we right. ;)

The battle had the crowd sitting on the edge of their seats, along with a few media mentions from The Straits Times to Esquire, Straatosphere and Vice.

Clog Two vs. Boon Baked (Semi-finals, 2 Dec)

The participating graffiti artists were stoked and were well rewarded with not just experience, but actual Google items like the Google Home. The champion, CLOGTWO received his very own set of the Google Tilt Brush, sponsored by Google of course.

For all the highlights - check out the video below.

BEHIND THE SCENES: BOOTLEG TOY SUPERVILLAIN

We first worked with The Sucklord for group toy exhibition Choking Hazard in February 2017, then in December 2017 for Dune: A Sci-fi Art Show. The inspiration point for his solo show at Kult was the artist’s sleazy yet meaningful take on the medium of bootlegs and how he manages to blur the lines between fine art and consumer products. Bootleg Toy Supervillain opened on 5 October 2018 after a six-month work-in-progress. Read through for the behind-the-scenes.

DRAWING BOARD

BOOTLEGS! They’re everywhere. From Guccy T-shirts to Hike Sandals & of course, The Super Sucklord’s ingenious toys. For self-dubbed super villain The Super Sucklord’s first inaugural solo show in Singapore, our level of enthusiasm was gladly met by the artist churning out over 50 pieces of bootleg framed cardbacks. The intention of the show was to illustrate the expansive universe of bootlegs, and how they can be used to comment on anything - pornography, politics, religion, education, celebrities and the news.

Screen Shot 2018-10-31 at 11.48.16 AM copy.png

WIP at The Sucklord’s studio in Chinatown, NYC.

ARTIST COLLABORATIONS

To give The Sucklord a big, bad welcome to Singapore, we rounded up established and up-and-coming toy makers and sculptors from the region to do an exclusive collab with the originator of the bootleg toy movement himself. Special shoutout to Jeffrey Koh for talking us through the process.

The Sucklord sent Daniel Yu (SG), Kabuki Master (TH), Mojoko (SG) and Quiccs (PH) a fat grab bag of weird and wonderful resin toy parts. The artists then took it from there, adding their own spin on the toys and creating individual packaging for them.

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For Daniel Yu and Quiccs, the collab went both ways. Both these artists sent The Sucklord their own signature toys to mess around with. Some cool results came out of the collaborations.

*Daniel Yu X The Sucklord (left), Quiccs x Sucklord (right)*

To top it all off, The Philippines Embassy & Philippines Airlines kindly flew Quiccs over to Kult for the show, where he worked with The Sucklord to customise the display area for their piece in the gallery. Shout out to San Miguel as well, for supplying us with booze for the night.

LOOK & FEEL + BONUS CONTENT

We knew we wanted to customise a bootleg mural and create video games in the gallery. We also knew we wanted to play up the Bootleg Chinatown feel. We worked with artist Cyntherea Tan, who used diarrhoea-cure ‘Po Chai Pills’ as a reference point. “DIY or die” was our motto. Everything flowed pretty smooth from hereon. Scroll through for WIP & bonus pix.

*Our designer, Nasrul Haqqim did up the key visual. This formed the tonality of the show.*

*Completed mural, splattered on by The Sucklord.*

*Like Han Solo frozen in Carbonite, but with cling wrap.*

Bootleg artcade game by Issac Ashwin and Jenson Gabriel Tan.

Bootleg artcade game, ‘SUCKADELIC Bootleg Factory’ by icipiracy (Igor Hooverwoord).

Spending the week with The Sucklord added the finishing touches to the exhibition.

*Conversations with him made their way onto the gallery walls.*

*We nudged people to create their own supervillain personas with a name generator “Your Supervillain Name Sucks” complete with a mask station to complete the look.*

*Singapore’s bedroom toy makers came out of their shell to gather feedback on their works from The Sucklord.*

Completed wall, brought to life with projection mapping.

CHILLIN’ WITH THE LORD

Our week went something like this:

Conversations were had with TOYSREVIL, MTV Asia, and Plural Art Mag.

BEHIND THE SCENES: WORD.

WORD. opened on 18 May 2018 after a 4-month work-in-progress. Read through for the behind-the-scenes.

DRAWING BOARD

One of the show’s biggest inspiration points was Microsoft’s “WordArt” function. It was the earliest form of typography for a lot of us, and the gateway to the process of combining art/design with words.

THE BRIEF

Here’s the brief that was sent out to artists for you curious cats. The artists were handpicked and given about 8 weeks to create their pieces, or submit suitable existing ones.

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ROUNDING UP THE TROOPS

For us, the exhibition had to represent as many languages and scripts as possible. Brainstorming out of Singapore, where a population made up of primarily Chinese, Malays, Indians and Eurasians, already contributed quite a number of visual scripts to the list, we looked for artists worldwide to accentuate this variety.

We also sieved out artists with especially visual takes on writing. Graphic designer, Mister Tucks’ (SG) series playing on Chinese characters immediately came to mind. The final lineup of artists included Singaporean Aleeloulalei, with her trademark bubble wrap art, this time taking on Braille, and Japan-based paper cutter Sexual Youkai.

*Aleeloulalei's painstaking art process*

Another big consideration for us was the way that scripts were currently being consumed. We mostly read text off screens now anyway. That’s where the works of Singaporean GIF maker Catherine Kusuma and Indonesian artist Ravi Mathovani (left) came in, adding a layer of dynamism to the show.

We’ve been obsessed with virtual and augmented realities at Kult since our sci-fi show Dune, and knew that we had to explore these ground-breaking vehicles to fully communicate the power of the written.

We caught wind of budding new media artist Haikel Yusuff, who eventually conceptualised and created two installations for the show - one augmented reality and the other sound reactive. Kids really enjoyed the sound reactive one.

Digital collective Saturday Kids was very generous about loaning their Oculus Rift headset with Google Tilt Brush app for the opening night of WORD. We ran into them at an art and technology event by tech collective MeshMinds earlier this year and they’ve been on our minds ever since.

Sound advisory: may blast your speakers

LOOK & FEEL

WORD MOODBOARD.jpg — The show needed to make a statement (quite literally). We drew inspo from some big, bold and bright work that was out in the world already. Our designer played around with the typography of the show 2name and added a spray can and a marker to further personify the diverse mediums and writing tools the artists worked with.

WORD_Collateral Line-up.jpg — The green that eventually became the base colour of the key visual also became a mnemonic device that threaded our several collaterals together. As an ode to the urban nature of the gallery, the visual received a grungy treatment to tell people the exhibition experience will be unlike your typical white-wall gallery.

The gallery then became an offline version of the key visual. The space was given fresh coats of paint in colours pulled from the design.

FOLLOW THE DOTTED LINES

Our activity station in the gallery was inspired by the penmanship exercises we used to do back in primary school. We revved up the Kult ante with these and got a few of the participating artists to write “WORD” freestyle.

Clockwise from top left: Chong Wah (SG), Mister Tucks (SG), Kid Acne (UK), Nicolas Adhitya (ID) — *Clockwise from top left: Chong Wah (SG), Mister Tucks (SG), Kid Acne (UK), Nicolas Adhitya (ID)*

DWORSKY & SONG

While rounding up artists for the show, our curator stumbled upon the works of a conceptual artist, Alexis Dworsky, who pioneered a Braille-graffiti project in Mexico. The conversation went something along the lines of this:

“His work is very cool. I want him in the show.”
[scrolls through Dworsky’s bio]
“HE’S GERMAN. I’M CALLING GOETHE.”

As the Goethe-Institut Singapore are ardent supporters of Kult and urban art, they kindly flew Dworsky from his Munich hometown over to our shores for the show. Then, the folks at Hotel G hooked him up with a super comfy nook to let up in for a couple of days. Now all we needed was a local graffiti writer for Dworsky to work with. Enter wonderboy, SONG.

song dworsky.jpg — It was great to collaborate with SONG! A new work of art has emerged—a piece that combines SONG's graphic design sense and my conceptual approach to art."
- Alexis Dworsky

SONG and Dworsky - who sound like a sleek detective duo when you put their names together - hit it off creatively. They got to work immediately, drilling, painting and co-creating a Braille-graffiti installation for the show.

“It was great to collaborate with SONG! A new work of art has emerged—a piece that combines SONG’s graphic design sense and my conceptual approach to art.””

— Alexis Dworsky

IT WAS IN THE WRITING

We had also started conversations with the team at Singapore Writers Festival (SWF) during WORD.’s early days. In spirit of SWF’s efforts to spread the love for the written word, they supported the gallery in marketing the show as a SWF POP initiative.

With the team, we also co-conceptualised a dialogue session entitled Over Pizza & Beer: The Art of the Written, with a panel consisting of professionals who work with words focusing on not what is written, but rather the ways in which text is presented.

Clockwise from top-left: Mark Yehan De Winne, Sarah & Schooling, Kelley Cheng, Desmond Kon Zhicheng-Mingdé

MUSIC

Something fun to round off this post. Click play to listen to tracks that became the perfect backdrop to the punchiness of the artworks from the show.

pop-dancey-urban

BEEN THERE: THE LASALLE SHOW 2018

Every year, we get a fresh batch of budding creatives graduating from LASALLE College of the Arts here in Singapore, and every year we at Kult look forward to yet another showcase of the freshest art and design work these kids have to offer. We’re here to give you a low-down of the good stuff by the BA(Hons) Design Communications graduates we spotted at the LASALLE Show 2018. Some speculative theories, subculture explorations and body art lovin’ are coming your way. Read on.

Th(ink)ingSingapore6.jpg — (Th)inking Singapore

You've got the Pinterest board of tatt inspirations ready. Now the only thing holding you back from getting inked is all the horror stories that you've heard - infections, botched tattoos and more. Breathe easy and check out http://www.thinkingsingapore.co/. In light of the slack legislation laws within Singapore’s tattoo industry and Joshua Lumain’s long-running love for tattoo art, he was determined to ease the stigma of body art. *(Th)inking Singapore* puts in place some good ol’ trust into the system, with support from renowned local tattoo artists.

Why we dig it:
One glance and we're drawn to Lumain’s characteristic, intricate illustrations - a really nice break from all the uber trendy minimalist Scandinavian types we saw a ton of at the show. From its visual conceptualisation to the comprehensive execution he has dreamt up, there is no denying the great effort and attention to detail Lumain has put into the entire project.

Joshua Lumain is a Filipino illustrator and designer based in Singapore. This one-to-watch draws, paints, sews and even tattoos. All of which he picked up by himself. Taken by his love for tattoo inking, he read deeper into its rich cultural history and roots across the globe and found flaws in the system, leading him to kickstart (Th)inking Singapore.

Streets to Exhibit

Debunking the whole notoriety linked to graffiti, Nur Anisa Binti Idris (Nisley) decided to pump in credibility to this stigmatised artform. Away from the public laws of vandalism, Nisley curated *Streets to Exhibit* at the Substation. She even took a jab at Singapore’s strict public art restrictions with a cheeky piece showcasing multiple mini-mockups of SMRT trains with graffiti. Experimental phases of the graffiti process were also showcased, alongside a tagging booth for visitors to try their hand at being a graffiti artist.

Why we dig it:
Nisley made us want to keep the conversation about street art and its discredited reputation going. Ultimately, how offensive it is first depends on the artist’s tact to choose what he/she wants to say through it. Streets to Exhibit was able to highlight the positives of graffiti and capture the enthusaism and candour of graffiti. Never doubt an artform’s viability, this one is here to thrive.

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Nisley is a passionate designer and has been pursuing this path of visual communication since her polytechnic days. Not only is she learning about art and design in her education, she is also teaching art at Rush-Me-Not Art studio in hopes of sharing the joy of learning and appreciating this creative outlet.

Cyberpunk Visual Cultures

Bringing the digital space into reality, Samiksha Nair materialised the cyberpunk subculture with an exhibition at Canvas Club with *Cyberpunk Visual Cultures*. Local music acts Perilune and DJ Aman Anand helmed the decks, adding on to the futuristic flair of the funky flourescent lighting. Think Akira, *Ghost in the Shell*, *BLAME!* And *Serial Experiments Lain*. 13 local artists and designers were also invited along the exciting journey speculating how technology will shape Singapore’s future.

Why we dig it:
Nair’s graphics are visually intriguing with vibrant colours. We loved the combination of GIFs and interactivity at the show. Visitors can stand in front of the webcam, and hold an expression which triggers a reaction from the programme. What’s more, we love how Nair served up some intellectual justice to a subculture that is often only taken at face value.

Samiksha Nair is a graphic designer specialising in design research and media studies. A visual chameleon herself, she has dabbed her toes in advertising, fashion, branding and digital marketing. Having also grown up across six cities, she loves meeting and working with new people which gives her a first-hand understanding of Pacific Asia’s design industry. This inquisitivity of hers also explains her open-minded view on a subculture that is often limited to the digital space.

Ylang Ylang

By experimenting with different deployment of panels, Soh Xinghao conceptualised *Ylang Ylang* (ylangylang.co) to highlight the overlooked importance of layout structures as a storytelling device in comics. Through printed collaterals as well as a website, he discussed the closely intertwined relationship between the narrative and layout.

Why we dig it:
You instantly get a sense of his zany way of thinking through his amusing menu navigation laid out like comic panels on Ylangylang.co. Xinghao made us think about an element that is easily overlooked when we go through graphic novels. Really makes you appreciate the thorough thought that goes into effectively communicating stories.

Aeronautical engineering diploma graduate aside, Soh Xinghao has a flair for illustration and graphic design. His works possesses the same quirkiness and enthusiasm in his personality. With a portfolio that impresses and speaks for themselves, it’s not hard to guess Xinghao enjoys telling stories through illustrations and making ideas come to life through visuals.

Mother of Mars

Together with Xuan Ha, Grace Duong dreamt up *Mother of Mars*, a speculative project about picking the best of the best in the gene pool and creating the strongest female army to champ the fictional Singapore Mars Colony. Bringing their make-believe world to reality, they set up a mobile laboratory outside Earl Lu Gallery, role playing as *Mother of Mars* physicians and performed tests on willing participants

Why we dig it:
Who says concepts of art and design have to be limited to a strong cultural or philosophical standpoint? Merging it with science and technology deserves more credit. Mother of Mars is intriguing and nudges you to think about previously impossible possibilities. Time to nerd out and beef up your knowledge of Mars colonisation and reproductive technology.

When she’s not swarmed with her academic works and thinking about extraterrestirial possibilities, Grace Duong lends her trained fashion eye to menswear label Faculty and runs an online retail space, Spacium, that stocks quality second-hand garments sourced from all over the world.