{"id":922,"date":"2017-09-12T15:40:38","date_gmt":"2017-09-12T07:40:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.brack.sg\/?p=922"},"modified":"2020-01-13T21:11:05","modified_gmt":"2020-01-13T13:11:05","slug":"brackchat-hello-session-with-kok-heng-leun-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/2017\/09\/12\/brackchat-hello-session-with-kok-heng-leun-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"#BrackChat: Hello Session with Kok Heng Leun (Part 1)"},"content":{"rendered":"
THE FOLLOWING EXCERPT IS FROM OUR chat Between\u00a0singaporean nominated member of parliament and artistic director of dramabox,<\/span><\/strong> Kok Heng<\/span> Leun<\/span><\/strong><\/a><\/span> and <\/strong>artist Yom<\/span> Bo Sung<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/strong>, Kirin Heng and Melanie Chua on 18 August 2017. THIS CONVERSATION was about various issues arising from \u2018the\u2019 Singaporean identity, as well as what the arts mean to Singaporeans. Owing to the depth of each issue discussed, this Brackchat excerpt is split into four parts. It IS PART OF THE\u00a0<\/strong>ARTIST-WRITER PAIR SERIES<\/span><\/strong><\/a><\/span>.\u00a0<\/strong>READ MORE in the upcoming <\/u><\/strong>Energy Issue<\/span><\/strong><\/a>.<\/u><\/strong><\/h5>\n
\"singapore<\/a>

From left: Yom Bo Sung, Kirin Heng and Kok Heng Leun<\/p><\/div>\n

On visual literacy\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/h1>\n

KHL: Visual literacy is something that is very lacking, in Singapore especially. For example, when you see an advertisement, are you able to discern all the different symbols being used? I don\u2019t think Singaporeans really do. Everything is taken at face value. So a naked painting for them is about nakedness. Not what it is. <\/em>In Singapore naked paintings in public places is an issue because we\u2019ve never seen naked sculptures around us. Whereas when you go to Europe, it is seen as more than just a body, it is seen as a piece of art. In a way, every art piece, especially visual art, is about visual languages. A visual literacy is so lacking here. So that every time a painting that just depicts two people embracing, [people here] can\u2019t go beyond that embrace.<\/p>\n

I think in the first place our education has never allowed us to develop visual literacy. I mean, I was just talking to NIE that day, to some of the VPA (visual performing arts) people, asking them, \u201cdo we have enough arts teachers?\u201d They said yes. But yet you realise when the Singaporean government says yes, what happens is that each primary school has one art teacher. But one art teacher to teach a whole cohort of six <\/em>levels? You know, it\u2019s about a thousand over students. I don\u2019t think the teacher can teach well. So they\u2019re probably regurgitating. So what do the students learn? I think arts education on a whole in Singapore is really quite bad, so there\u2019s no visual literacy. Which is most important because the first thing you do when you\u2019re born is open your eyes and see something. Everything is about seeing. And we\u2019re so used to our sight that we think what we see is what it is. And yet we\u2019ve never been able to unpack what we see.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why languages became our way of communication and it\u2019s the easy way. And we keep thinking that languages are the thing that help us to communicate when actually it\u2019s not. We don\u2019t even see our body language when we communicate and we\u2019re not very conscious of it. We\u2019re not even conscious that language is actually a very complex creature by itself. Words that you use, the he or the she in all these contexts\u2026 We\u2019re just not very critical of this.<\/p>\n

KH: And they don\u2019t really emphasis rhetoric [in schools] either. Or persuasion.<\/p>\n

KHL: Yes. They can\u2019t. That’s where education plays a very important role.<\/p>\n

Y: Unless you do English literature. That might be different.<\/p>\n

KH: But I do feel it\u2019s more\u2026<\/p>\n

Y: About analysis.<\/p>\n

KH: And it\u2019s less about speaking and body language. Or about argumentation.<\/p>\n

KHL: And you don\u2019t even enjoy the language. You don\u2019t read it out. You don\u2019t actually sense how the language is being constructed. Poetry is taught on paper, you know. Here is what the poetry is like. Here, the rhyme. But I don\u2019t know whether the teacher reads it there or not.<\/p>\n

Because poetry is actually music. It is <\/em>a music in itself. But when it\u2019s taken as something to just analyse the context of, then you lose the aspect of one of the best forms of art.<\/p>\n

Y: Do you think that the education system is also responsible for how Singaporeans categorize themselves? I\u2019m coming at this from the situations when my peers show me a painting and say \u201cI can\u2019t appreciate this. I think that is too intellectual for me\u201d or \u201cI think that is too artistic for me.\u201d Whereas if you were to tell an American that you can\u2019t come into this exhibition because it\u2019s too intellectual for you, there would be protests. And here, they would just accept it and leave.<\/p>\n

KH: Or it\u2019s too \u2018artsy\u2019 for them, too niche for them.<\/p>\n

KHL:\u00a0All those excuses are lazy excuses. It\u2019s a matter of laziness, not wanting to take the leap forward, on the part of the viewer, the audience. It\u2019s also related to how society has been constructed. We\u2019ve been given so much safety that you\u2019re always assured that if you\u2019re in here, if you belong in this category, that\u2019s how you should progress. And so take for example, streaming is actually a game of putting people into the right box, into the right place so that you function in the machine.<\/p>\n

In the machine you don\u2019t ask what the other thing is doing. You do what you need to do. We are framed like a machine. <\/em><\/h3>\n

And in fact, our education system is like that. Our education system is ultimately\u2026 That\u2019s why they will never take away PSLE (the Primary School Leaving Examinations). Because they need to know how each of us perform, so that they know where you will go in the next phase of your life, and your next phase of your life is not <\/em>your life actually, it\u2019s your economic lifespan. You need to be in here, so that you can move into this, move into [that]. Then, you will join in that whole big economic machinery in that particular unit. When they are framed in this way, taught in that way \u201caye, I\u2019m a maths student\u201d, \u201cI\u2019m an economics student\u201d, \u201cI\u2019m a teacher\u201d, \u201cI\u2019m — whatever\u201d, it actually is a frame of what you should do and can do best.<\/p>\n

You feel comfortable in it because you\u2019ve been told that this is how you can be the best of what you are. You would not want to venture out, you see. For fear that you will fail. They already put you in there, so this is the only way you won\u2019t fail, and [instead] be successful in life. Especially because we\u2019re such a middleclass city. Middle-class people are always trapped in the situation where you do not want to lose out and you cannot afford to fail.<\/em><\/h3>\n

I do think it\u2019s the education system. I also think it\u2019s very convenient and lazy. But maybe because they\u2019re so tired of [competing]. [As a theatre practitioner], you\u2019d get an audience who\u2019d just come to enjoy [and for] entertainment. \u201cWhy do you make me think so hard?\u201d [they\u2019d say]. As if thinking <\/em>is hard work. Why? Because since young, thinking for them is trying to sort out the maths problem, science problem. All thinking is used in that way. Never used creatively. So thinking is a chore. Never a liberation.<\/p>\n

M: That\u2019s quite chilling. But yes, it feels quite real. Because here\u2019s the dichotomy — where we go to work and to the mall. And then we study, or go on Facebook.<\/p>\n

(Featured image from 50 years of Theatre Memories, source:\u00a0https:\/\/theatrememories.wordpress.com\/2015\/02\/26\/kok-heng-leun\/)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

THE FOLLOWING EXCERPT IS FROM OUR chat Between\u00a0singaporean nominated member of parliament and artistic director of dramabox, Kok Heng Leun and artist Yom Bo Sung, Kirin Heng and Melanie Chua on 18 August 2017. THIS CONVERSATION was about various issues arising from \u2018the\u2019 Singaporean identity, as well as what the arts mean to Singaporeans. Owing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":928,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[159],"class_list":["post-922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-conversations","tag-brackchatkokhengleun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=922"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":970,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922\/revisions\/970"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brack.sg\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}