ART-PRESENTATION: The Oceanic

Laura Anderson Barbata, Bird Fish Prince, 2017, Costume consisting seven pieces including crown, mixed fibre coat, pants with sequins, shaggy skirt, decorated t-shirt, two shaggy wing extensions, 271 x 68 x 55 cm, Courtesy the artistThe exhibition “The Oceanic” marks the start of NTU CCA Singapore’s new overarching research topic CLIMATES. HABITATS. ENVIRONMENTS., which inform and connect the Centre’s various activities ranging from research to residencies and exhibitions. This is the third exhibition by the Centre, to feature long-term, critical enquiries by artists about the radical changes for communities whose livelihoods are inseparable from the sea, the precarious labour at sea, and the irreversible impact of technologically driven human interventions on the oceans.

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: NTU CCA Singapore Archive

The exhibition “The Oceanic” is focusing on large-scale human interventions in oceanic ecospheres with contributions by 12 artists, filmmakers, composers, and researchers who engage with both the long cultural histories of Pacific Ocean archipelagos and their current conditions.  As part of TBA21-Academy’s project “The Current”, an ongoing research initiative into pressing environmental, economic, and socio-political concerns, NTU CCA Singapore’s Founding Director Professor Ute Meta Bauer was invited to lead the project’s first cycle of expeditions. The featured contributors in the exhibition are “The Current” Fellows who joined TBA21-Academy’s vessel “Dardanella” to Papua New Guinea, French Polynesia and Fiji. Participating in all three expeditions was Armin Linke, who not only documented these journeys with his camera, but also questioned the role of image production in such unique yet loaded encounters. The expedition to Papua New Guinea (2015), with Laura Anderson Barbata, Tue Greenfort, Newell Harry and Jegan Vincent de Paul, took as a starting point the concept of the Kula Ring, a ceremonial exchange system practiced in the Trobriand Islands.  The second excursion, to French Polynesia (2016), titled “Tuamotus”, the Tahitian name for distant islands, included: Nabil Ahmed, Atif Akin, PerMagnus Lindborg and Filipa Ramos. The atolls Mururoa and Fangataufa were the sites for 193 nuclear tests between 1966 and 1996, despite being declared a biosphere reserve by UNESCO in 1977. This expedition discussed the still neglected long-term impact of nuclear experiments in the Pacific on the populations and the environment.  On the third and last expedition of this cycle in 2017, the Fijian practice of the Tabu/Tapu, where a community chief demarcates something as “sacred,” or “forbidden,” continued the enquiry on the Polynesian Rahui, a traditional rule system that in recent times became significant for marine conservation and resource management. This journey to the Fijian Lau Islands was joined by: Guigone Camus, Lisa Rave and Kristy H. A. Kang. The interest in exposing the technology behind the human infrastructures is present in Armin Linke’s video installation “OCEANS – Dialogues between ocean floor and water column” (2017) while Tue Greenfort explores complex ecosystems and scientific production practices, challenging human understanding of and relationship with nature and culture. Inspired by the materials used for gift exchanges such as the Kula Ring, Newell Harry documents this practice in his B&W photo series “(Untitled) Nimoa and Me: Kiriwina Notes” (2015-16), and “(Untitled) Anagrams and Objects for RU & RU” (2015) with text on tapa, a cloth made from softened bark. Likewise incorporating items by artisans from Milne Bay Province, Laura Anderson Barbata produced costumes for the performative piece “Ocean Calling” (2017), created as part of TBA21–Academy’s intervention on World Ocean Day 2017. Addressing the exploitation of finite resources, Nabil Ahmed collaborates with other researchers to call for an “Inter-Pacific Ring Tribunal (INTERPRT)” (2016– ), a long-term investigation into environmental justice in the Pacific region. Lisa Rave’s film “Europium” (2014) investigates this rare eponymous mineral that has become one of the allures of deep-sea mining, the new gold rush spreading across the global oceans. In “Europium”, Rave also draws the often invisible connections between colonialism, ecology, and currencies. The exhibition also includes a sound component by PerMagnus Lindborg who recorded the land and underwater soundscapes of the Tuamotus in French Polynesia, as well as a film program. Jegan In The Lab, the Centre’s project space, anthropologist Guigone Camus displays documentation from the Fiji expedition, as well as diverse materials from her extensive research in Kiribati, while Kristy H. A. Kang reflects on her experience in Fiji through an iterative installation and research process that will explore vernacular forms of mapping cultural memory and spatial narrative.

Info: NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore (NTU CCA Singapore), Block 43 Malan Road, Singapore, Duration: 9/12/17-4/3/18, Days & Hours: Tue-Thu & Sat-Sun 12:00-19:00, Fri 12:00-21:00, http://ntu.ccasingapore.org

Newell Harry, An old Mawali Kula shell of elder, Hon, Camillus Mlabwema, Kotovila Village, Yalumgwa, Kiriwina Island, Papua New Guinea, 2015, Documentation, Courtesy the artist
Newell Harry, An old Mawali Kula shell of elder, Hon, Camillus Mlabwema, Kotovila Village, Yalumgwa, Kiriwina Island, Papua New Guinea, 2015, Documentation, Courtesy the artist

 

 

Newell Harry, Kula canoe, Oyabia, Kiriwina Lagoon, 2015, Documentation, Courtesy the artist
Newell Harry, Kula canoe, Oyabia, Kiriwina Lagoon, 2015, Documentation, Courtesy the artist

 

 

Armin Linke, OCEANS. Dialogues between ocean floor and water column, 2017, Still from four-channel video installation, realised in collaboration with the Edith-Russ-Haus for Media Art Part of the project “Year of Science 2016*17 – Seas and Oceans,” German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Commissioned and co-produced by TBA21–Academy, Courtesy the artist
Armin Linke, OCEANS. Dialogues between ocean floor and water column, 2017, Still from four-channel video installation, realised in collaboration with the Edith-Russ-Haus for Media Art Part of the project “Year of Science 2016*17 – Seas and Oceans,” German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, Commissioned and co-produced by TBA21–Academy, Courtesy the artist

 

 

Lisa Rave, Europium (Video Still), 2014, HD video, sound, 21 min, Courtesy the artist
Lisa Rave, Europium (Video Still), 2014, HD video, sound, 21 min, Courtesy the artist

 

 

Newell Harry, (Untitled) Nimoa and Me: Kiriwina Notes, 2015–16, Photograph, 17.5 x 26 cm, Courtesy the artist and Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery-Sydney
Newell Harry, (Untitled) Nimoa and Me: Kiriwina Notes, 2015–16, Photograph, 17.5 x 26 cm, Courtesy the artist and Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery-Sydney