An art exhibition

Includes biodata and acknowledgment

A fact has no appearance : art beyond the object -- Making "marks" and leaving "evidences" : the art of Johnny Manahan 1971-82 -- Redza Piyadasa in the 1970s : cerebral maneouvres, cultural assertions -- Melting into air : Tan Teng-Kee in Singapore

National Gallery Singapore is proud to present A Fact Has No Appearance: Art Beyond the Object, an exhibition that looks at the impact of new ideas on art in Southeast Asia during the 1970s. This is explored through case studies of the work of Johnny Manahan (Philippines), Redza Piyadasa (Malaysia) and Tan Teng-Kee (Malaysia/Singapore), all of whom have been recognised for breaking new ground in Southeast Asian modern art.The 1960s and 1970s were pivotal decades when artists around the world began to reject standard ideas of art making and presentation, and resisted the role of commercial galleries and institutions as arbiters of value and merit. Steeped in the conceptualism of the period, Manahan, Piyadasa and Tan questioned the notions of permanence in their work, each offering powerfully inventive ways to readdress the concretising of ideas as aesthetic objects. The three took established artistic forms-photography, painting and sculpture-and turned them on their heads, introducing interactivity, text, moving images and everyday materials to open up a range of possibilities and slippages within the art object. Although many of their works from the '70s have not survived, or have survived in degraded conditions, due often to their ephemeral conception and construction,
they remain important in the art history of the region.

In English.