by Bilqis Hijjas

Most dance productions have to be seen in person. No video, no matter how accurately captured and carefully edited, can compare with the ability of the human eye to encompass the width of the stage in one instant, then hone in to focus on the swivel of an eyeball in the next. That said, there are a few occasions when watching a dance production in person is so frustrating and uncomfortable that a video comes as a welcome blessing. ”Seven Skins’ at the launch of The Light Show at the Annexe Central Market was one such instance.

by ARTERI

Well, not really. But we’re excited by the mere possibility that our new Information, Unity and Culture minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim will debate with former de-facto law minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim on national TV. As reported in Bernama, Dr Rais challenged Zaid Ibrahim to a debate over certain allegations made against our current premier, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, on 24 April 2009. Zaid Ibrahim replied later that day with ‘anywhere, any place, any time’. (*insert big ‘wwoooooooooooo’ from invisible crowd here*) The gauntlet has been thrown down and the challenge accepted.

By Eva McGovern

From February – May 2009 Ossage Gallery, Kwun Tong, Hong Kong is presenting Some Rooms, an exhibition that is a slice of contemporary art from Southeast Asia. 5 Curators were paired with two artists (selected by Ossage) each from Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and, (strangely in my mind) Hong Kong. I had the opportunity to work as one of the curators, and managed to learn an incredible amount about curating, about creating meaning, about categorising artists by nationality and the challenges of representation.

by Yin Shao Loong

Amir Muhammad’s Malaysian Gods (MG) offers an amalgam of two strands of Malaysian life. The first being a history of the genesis of Malaysian reformasi relayed in English text. The second is interviews in Tamil or Tamil creole with a variety of Tamil speakers. Like an amalgam these two strands have different properties but are nonetheless juxtaposed in the hopes of exerting a useful effect on each other. Street politics is matched with life from the streets.

by Lydia Chai

There is a famous moment in Laurence Sterne’s eighteenth century novel, The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, when the character Yorick dies and we the readers are then confronted with an entire black page.

This odd literary device might elicit laughter and amusement because of its simplistic representation of death, darkness, and fear of nothingness.

We might also think it poignant that the story’s long-winded narrator, Tristram, finds himself at a sudden loss for words and can only express his grief with a silent, dark page.

by Yusuf Martin

It is inevitable that we should consider the two, lightness and darkness, inextricably entwined, latter born of the former, each linked, for eternity, in bonds of the other.

It is from mysterious obsidian shadows that Rembrandt’s philosopher becomes enlightened, a tangled helix staircase revealed in all its wooden glory; three translucent brides evolving from Jan Toorop’s symbolic gloom, which of the light and which the sinister.

by ARTERI

Hiding hiding hiding on 25th April.

It’s a party.

Saturday, 25 April 2009, 8:30pm onwards. All are welcome. Contact us for details, venue and directions!!

by ARTERI

Two Southeast Asian new media artists + filmmakers’ debut feature films will be screened at this year’s Cannes’s Directors’ Fortnight. Sabah-born Chris Chong’s elegiac KARAOKE will be the first Malaysian feature film in 14 years to be screened on the Directors’ Fortnight platform, while Singapore makes its fifth year of consecutive presence in the Cannes Film Festival with Ho Tzu-Nyen’s poignantly surreal feature, HERE.

by Sharon Chin

Of all the openings I’ve been to (including my own), the one for The Light Show at Annexe Gallery last Thursday stands out as truly memorable. It was was the first time I’d seen so many people at an exhibition opening, ever. The energy in the air was palpable. It seemed like all the worlds of KL’s design, art, architecture and performance communities had converged in one place. It was awesome.

by Daniel Chong

Folks, what you see above is a picture I took with a dinky camera that chose to die on me before I caught a clear shot. My apologies for its awful graininess, but if you will bare with me for a short while, I want to share with you some observations I made that was very personally enriching.

by ARTERI x The Fairly Current Show

It seems that the by-election fever has not subsided! With five by-elections done and one more (possibly?) to come, it’s pretty safe to say that some kind of a democracy is definitely in action in this country. Looks like we all have to work overtime, phantom voters notwithstanding.

by Bilqis Hijjas

On rainy Sunday afternoons, KLPac seems like a warm glowing hub of humanity in a gray wet world. In the cafe, tables of friends laugh and clink their glasses of wine. Upstairs an orchestra is practicing – the sound of their brass and drums filters down to the foyer. A waiter with a trolley of beer clatters past. People filter in for the matinee in Pentas 2, chattering and twirling their wet umbrellas.

by Simon Soon

I’m convinced that the fascination with kitsch is driven by a complex feeling that displays just as much affection as repulsion for the subject. Liew Kung Yew’s one man show in Petronas gallery, Cadangan-cadangan untuk Negara Ku, is no exception – and I was trying to get this out of the artist.

By Eva McGovern

With names such as They, The Kioue, Tha-B, The A80s, The Damis, Mile09, F-code, Jo Tribe, Phobia Klik and Vector Crew to name a few of the pyseudonyms, graffiti artists in KL are committed to their practice. The largest and longest and perhaps most well know ‘gallery’ of their work used to be the along the banks of the Klang River by Pasar Seni LRT. Beginning in 2006 it soon became an organised project with artists being invited to contribute which eventually led to 300 meters of artwork on display by over 30 artists.

by Sharon Chin

When I was young, I was babysat by my grandma, together with my cousin sister. She would spend the day with us, teaching us how to be proper ladies. I wasn’t any good at being a lady, but the nice thing about days with Po-po was that we always got a present that was some kind of stationary. She would buy two different things, and then we had to choose. One time, the choice was between this awesome pencil case (like seriously, it was blingin’) and a small box of Luna Staedtler colour pencils. It was the one with a boat on the cover and 12 barely 10cm-long pencils inside. My cousin got the pencil case (much to her delight), which left the colour pencils to me. It was my first box, and I loved them. These pencils have a very rough texture, but their pigment is intense. They are great for frottage, which is a technique where you put a piece of paper over something and rub a a pencil/crayon over it. I used to do with coins so that I had my own multi-coloured paper money.