Wei Leng Tay
「你就慢慢考虑, 慢慢选择⋯⋯」: 13x50, you think it over slowly, slowly choose...’: 13x50, 2018
650 inkjet prints on tissue
Dimensions variable
Edition of 1 plus 1 AP
Copyright The Artist
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“you think it over slowly, slowly choose...”: 13x50 comprises 650 photographic tissue (kleenex) prints based on re-photographs of 13 existing 3R photographs of Tay’s grandaunt found across the families -...
“you think it over slowly, slowly choose...”: 13x50 comprises 650 photographic tissue (kleenex) prints based on re-photographs of 13 existing 3R photographs of Tay’s grandaunt found across the families - birthdays, a graduation, a wedding, Tay’s sister sitting on her lap. In the tissue work, each of the 13 3R photo prints is re-photographed 50 times with different crops and focuses with the artist’s smartphone, an everyday photo-graphic device held close to one’s body. Each frame highlights particular relationships through specific representations of touch, place, people and objects in the photographs, and one shot is made for every year she was in Singapore. The 650 prints on tissue paper (Kleenex) are made with an inkjet printer. Disposable and seemingly weightless, these fragile prints reflect the tenuous nature of these past relationships (within family, between the state and the individual, and with oneself), and the elusive nature of memories in their re-telling.
The project begins with my grandaunt, who looked after my sisters and myself as small children but who I hardly remember. She crossed into Singapore in 1955 with her 10-year-old son when it was still a British Crown colony, before it became an independent country and nation state in 1965. Grandaunt lived in Singapore for 50 years till her death in 2004. During that time, she was stateless and excluded from the privileges of citizenship; she was trapped in a place that wasn’t a country when she arrived and one she couldn’t leave after it became one. The work is based on interviews I conducted, and found photographs and papers.
The project begins with my grandaunt, who looked after my sisters and myself as small children but who I hardly remember. She crossed into Singapore in 1955 with her 10-year-old son when it was still a British Crown colony, before it became an independent country and nation state in 1965. Grandaunt lived in Singapore for 50 years till her death in 2004. During that time, she was stateless and excluded from the privileges of citizenship; she was trapped in a place that wasn’t a country when she arrived and one she couldn’t leave after it became one. The work is based on interviews I conducted, and found photographs and papers.
Exhibitions
Staring Into Voids and Blues, 14 September – 20 October 2024, Yeo Workshop, SingaporeCrossings, solo exhibition at NUS Museum, Singapore, from 2018-2019
Set Up, Bard UBS Exhibition Center, Red Hook, USA, 2018
Concept Context Contestation, Secretariat, with Goethe Institut and Bangkok Art and Culture Centre, Yangon, Myanmar, 2019
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