展覽名稱｜新加坡雙年展2022
參展藝術家｜薩望翁・雍維
展覽期間｜2022.10.18-2023.03.19
展覽地點｜新加坡美術館
The seventh edition of the Singapore Biennale (SB2022) is named Natasha. The act of naming serves as a prompt to artists, collaborators, and audiences to re-discover ways of seeing and relating to the world. Going to Natasha is to embrace the possibility of intimacy and spontaneity afforded by such recognition, as well as to reflect on the transformative potential within life and its relations — from self to others, from human to non-human, from living to non-living and vice versa, and beyond. The artists and collaborators thus become ‘fellow travellers’ in the journey of Natasha, expressed through artistic imagination and research. Featuring over 50 artists and collaborators embarking on a collective journey with Natasha, Singapore Biennale 2022 will take place from 16 October 2022 to 19 March 2023.
The Opium Parallax and Footnotes are two related works by Sawangwongse Yawnghwe, which register the history and conditions surrounding opium trade and use in the region from the artist’s perspective. Presented in the format of an installation, The Opium Parallax is installed suspended so that it can be regarded from both sides, thereby conveying the idea of the parallax. Behind the matrix on one side of the artwork is an abstracted form that emerges from oil paint bleed-through, which Yawnghwe considers a “skeleton key”—a representation of a simplified and limited perception of the opium-heroin trade. Surrounding The Opium Parallax is Footnotes, a series of paintings depicting scenes from Yawnghwe’s personal history and references to the narcotics trade. Together, both works provide a glimpse into the complex web of relations that exists around the consumption and trade of opium in Myanmar and that extends to the region of Southeast Asia and beyond.
