In Conversation: Go Green or Nature Sells? With Phuong Phan (Vietnam), and Panel Speaker Dr. Chang Jiat Hwee, School of Design and Environment, National University of Singapore, with reference to Jef Geys: Quadra Medicinale Singapore

In Conversation: Go Green or Nature Sells? With Phuong Phan (Vietnam), and Panel Speaker Dr. Chang Jiat Hwee, School of Design and Environment, National University of Singapore, with reference to Jef Geys: Quadra Medicinale Singapore

Through the format of a panel discussion with invited scholars, architects, horticulturalists and urban planners, Phan places the spotlight on questions of specificity and transferability of the Singaporean architectural paradigm: can the city’s specific architectural ‘dialect’ be considered a ‘Singaporean model’, and in what ways does it speak to or infiltrate contemporary discourses around sustainability, the return to ‘nature’, and geopolitical demographics? Further, is this dialect bound to remain a vernacular of South Pacific architecture, or is it potentially a model for a universal architectural language of a changing world?

The panel takes place as an intervention within the Quadra Medicinale Singapore exhibition by the late Belgian artist Jef Geys, who was known for questioning mainstream and organised systems of urban planning and information dissemination in his artistic practice. Geys casted doubt on the fundaments of language and visual representation, interrogating art’s relation to meaning-making. Similarly, Phan plays with the structures of language in her long-standing research in urban architecture and urban planning. She posits that operating within the vocabulary of contemporary international architecture, Singapore’s unique architectural aesthetic, characterised by an omnipresence of greenery, could possibly be understood as a ‘dialect’ of contemporary architecture.

A public programme of Acts of Life.

2019-01-26

The panel takes place as an intervention within the Quadra Medicinale Singapore exhibition by the late Belgian artist Jef Geys, who was known for urban planning and information dissemination in his artistic practice.

General

Professional

Onsite (CCA)

No

No

No