Untitled (Ceilings)
Bryan Chia, Lu Yixin, and Mary Ann Ng
23 March - 31 July / Venue TBC
Free admission (Subject to prevailing safe management measures)
Untitled (Ceilings) is an installation that hopes to challenge viewers to consider infinity and possibility, where humanity remembers to dream in a time of rapid change and uncertainty. The physical act of dreaming, as the head looks up to the sky/ heavens, gives one hope and boost wellbeing.
Untitled (Ceilings) creates a visual effect of “flattening the sky” creating a 2D surface capable of bringing infinity closer to people. Using an array of magnifying sheets, audience experience a surreal, whimsical distortions of the world around them and their views change into kaleidoscope of endless possibilities depending on the distance of interaction. The multitude of different refractions contained in the installation also celebrates the notions of diversity and multiple perspectives that are much needed in a time where the world continues to be more divisive.
Light from the sky/ heavens is refracted and directed onto the ground to form interesting pattern. The idea of bringing something high from the heavens such as sunlight onto earth acts as a metaphor for grounded-ness and humility in the face of massive ambition.
Untitled (Ceilings) is the winning submission for NUS’ inaugural student public art competition. The competition was developed by NUS Museum’s student interns in 2021, and commissioned by NUS Centre For the Arts for NUS Arts Festival 2022, in collaboration with the Centre for Quantum Technologies. The competition was organised as part of NUS’ Public Art Initiative, launched in 2021 to make public art central to campus life. It is hoped that this would pave the way for the NUS community to connect, bond and belong, thus expressing our shared identity and common cause.
Competition submissions responded to the competition theme on Shades of Light(ness), illustrated through Ali Smith’s quote: “In the dark is where we work out what the light is, and in the winter is where we work out why we want spring, and in the lack of hope is where we make hope.”
Bryan is a Year 1 Architecture undergraduate at NUS. He is fascinated by the systems that govern the functioning of this world, and even more so by the arbitrary ones many subscribe to. The rare snippets of moments he has seen outside the studio are spent searching for the latest dessert hot spot or just lazing in bed... indulging in the binge consumption of media content.
Yixin is a Year 1 Architecture undergraduate at NUS. He is interested in finding ways to talk about very specific feelings of existential anxiety, ambivalence, nothingness and the lack of resolution. He was born in China and lives in Singapore.
Mary Ann is both researcher and designer, her interests stem from the contemporary individual, their subsequent emergent lifestyles, online and offline social practices and new cognitive behaviours within the spatial context. She holds a Master of Architecture (RIBA II) from the National University of Singapore.
