Curated by Ho See Wah

STPI is thrilled to be presenting a showcase of new releases from renowned artists Yanyun Chen, Hong Zhu An and Prabhavathi Meppayil, created during each artist’s residency with the Creative Workshop.

The collection of works reflects on each artists’ residency as a point of divergence from their usual practices, as they embark on a new journey of conceptual and material explorations in the Creative Workshop.

“I realise more and more how the stories I choose to tell through my works have a lot to do with my difficulties with tradition, both in form and subject matter. On one hand, we celebrate traditions as markers for our identity and as a way of honouring our value systems, lineage and ancestry; on the other hand, traditions are also limitations, structures, and barriers. They are gatekeepers for what is currently acceptable.”

At STPI For Chen, “departure” was a main theme that surfaced during her residency with STPI. “Departure” here not only refers to leaving something behind but of journeying down new paths as well, both conceptually and materially. Her STPI works take on an ephemerallike quality, in obvious contrast to her usually-dense charcoal drawings which she is highly-skilled in and well-recognised for. In the span of three weeks, the artist was impelled to experiment beyond the familiar due to working with foreign methods and collaborators. Chen, therefore, aimed to push each piece further and further in a generative process, with each being a departure from her previous practice, the previous test prints, and even the previous copy within the same series of work. This can be especially attributed to Chen’s unfamiliarity with the world of print and papermaking, which meant having to improvise based on what was placed in front of her. In turn, it was also an act of improvisation for the workshop team as the artist put forth ideas that went against technical conventions.