Curatorial Practice]]> Cultural Heritage]]> History]]> T.K. Sabapathy]]> Southeast Asia]]> Decolonialism]]>
Research Focus

In addition to publishing of History of Java (1817), Raffles curated displays of objects and pictures from Southeast Asia in his London homes. Through these displays, Raffles promoted several archetypes for colonial fantasies of Southeast Asia that were recirculated through the 20th century. During the fellowship, Masterson will examine the ways in which contemporary Singaporean artists appropriate and re-contextualise these images of the tropics for their specific aims.]]>
Piers Masterson]]>
Architecture]]>
Research Focus

Azra Akšamija’s projects explore the potency of art and architecture to facilitate the process of transformative conflict mediation though cultural pedagogy, and in so doing, provide a framework for analysing and intervening in contested socio-political realities. Her recent work focuses on the representation of Islam in the West, architectural forms of nationalism in the Balkans since the 1990s, and the role of cultural institutions and heritage in constructing common good in divided societies. Akšamija investigates the role of cultural and religious identity in conflicts, especially in the recent history of the Yugoslavian war and its aftermath.
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Azra Akšamija]]> Azra Aksamija]]> Middle East]]> Europe]]>
History]]> Spaces of the Curatorial]]>
Research Focus

Roger Nelson's research is on modern and contemporary art in Southeast Asia, with a particular focus on trans-media intersections between visual and other forms of art, as well as with urban spaces and other texts. The role of women in discourses of the modern and the contemporary is a recurring concern in his research, which is mostly concentrated on Cambodia, Laos, and other areas of peninsular Southeast Asia. Interested in historiographies of art in Southeast Asia, Nelson recently published a major research report on terminologies of “modern” and “contemporary” “art” in nine Southeast Asian vernacular languages, co-authored with ten other contributors, all based in the region, and published in 
Southeast of Now: Directions in Contemporary and Modern Art in Asia. Also historiographical in nature, Nelson recently completed a journal article on recent independent curatorial initiatives in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, which is currently under peer review; in that essay, he argues that independent curatorial research and practice performs art historical functions in these contexts. Nelson's translation of a 1961 Khmer nationalist novel by Suon Sorin, titled A New Sun Rises Over the Old Land, is forthcoming with NUS Press; in his introduction to that publication, he argues for the value of the literary text as a resource for art historical and other forms of research. He is a participating scholar in a two-year Getty Foundation-funded project titled “Site and Space in Southeast Asia.” There, Nelson's research focuses on downtown Rangoon in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, considering the dynamic relationships between painting, photography, sex work, and discourses about women in the booming and cosmopolitan Burmese port city. Also relating to discourses about women, gender, and feminisms, Nelson is co-editor with Yvonne Low and Clare Veal of a forthcoming special issue of Southeast of Now, and co-convenor with them of international research gatherings on gender in Southeast Asian art histories. ]]>
Roger Nelson]]> Southeast Asia]]> Oceania]]>
Sustainability]]> Labour]]> Urbanism]]> Yvonne P. Doderer]]> Europe]]> Architecture]]> Geopolitics]]> Urbanism]]>

Research Focus

Fellowship period: 1 June – 31 December 2016

During his residency, Dr Etienne Turpin will be researching the role of urban labs, maker spaces, and hacker collectives, in the context of South and Southeast Asian urbanisation. His work will help to develop the Urban Lab Network Asia, simultaneously investigating the work of urban labs through ethnographic research and inviting organisations to participate in the platform which enables the network. With the support of his design practice—anexact office—Dr Turpin will further the work of “making the multiple” by documenting encounters with activists, organisers, and community groups who are experimenting with urbanisation processes through various types of design-led inquiry and applied research. The outcome of this research, a film titled “Is the City a Laboratory?” and a working-documentary process assembled as “The Multiple Must Be Made,” will be included in the forthcoming NTU CCA Singapore exhibition Incomplete Urbanism: Attempts of Critical Spatial Practice, and will help to develop the web-based platform labnet.asia.

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Etienne Turpin]]> Southeast Asia]]> North America]]>
Materiality]]> Urbanism]]> Artistic Research]]>
Research Focus

Fellowship period: 1 July – 31 December 2016

During her fellowship, Sissel Tolaas will be carrying out fieldwork and research on everyday smells in urban environments: smell and tolerance, smell and communication, smell and navigation, etc. Her research focus is on the smell identities of Singapore's diverse neighbourhoods. Tolaas will carry out fieldwork in selected neighbourhoods, particularly areas that have been developed by Singaporean architect William Lim. She will collect and investigate the smell phenomena of each neighbourhood, mapping these neighbourhoods according to their smells. The outcome of Tolaas' research will be presented in NTU CCA Singapore's forthcoming exhibition Incomplete Urbanism: Attempts of Critical Spatial Practice.

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Sissel Tolaas]]> Europe]]> Southeast Asia]]>
Artistic Research]]>
Research Focus

Residency period: 1 January – 31 March 2016

Yvonne Spielmann’s research aims to explore contemporary arts in Southeast Asia comparatively, discussing the contexts of contemporary arts practices with a focus on infrastructure, social and political framework, aesthetic and cultural tradition, colonial/postcolonial history, religious and ethnic diversity, and the point of departure of the development of modern and contemporary arts practices in each country. Spielmann’s comparative study will give an overview on the Southeast Asian region, focusing on the countries Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

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Yvonne Spielmann]]> Southeast Asia]]>
Embodiment]]> Identity]]> Regina (Maria) Möller]]> Regina Moller]]> Institutional Critique]]> Geopolitics]]> Urbanism]]>
Research Focus

Urban subjects, politics, pop, economic criticism, architecture, design, art and theory]]>
Jesko Fezer]]>