Material Index

Atlantika Collective member Yam Chew Oh recently showed eight sculptures at Material Index, the Young Talent Exhibition at Affordable Art Fair (AAF) NYC 2021. Curated by Keren Moskovitch, Material Index features works that explore the relationship between the artist, materials, and identity. The three artists in the exhibition, including Arantxa Ximena Rodriguez and Lisa DiDonato, employ the physicality of material to express solidarity with transcultural origins, and animate individual and ancestral memory. 

Floating on detritus (2018)

I love you, warts and all (2017)

Oh is a multidisciplinary artist, educator, and storyteller whose work explores circumstance, time, and attention through history, relationships, and the everyday. His late father was a karung guni man, the Singapore equivalent of the rag-and-bone/junk man, who scavenged and sold used and unwanted items for a living. Growing up, helping his father with his trade had a deep impact on Oh's love for discarded and found materials, and how he treats them. He privileges the humble, overlooked, and flawed through gestures aimed at protecting the past and accentuating the now. “My sculptures and assemblages reflect the characteristics of karung guni, in particular, modesty of means, precarity, and transformation,” says Oh.

The karung guni man (rag-and-bone) (2018)

The Vow (2018)

The works that Oh exhibited at the AAF were made mostly in 2018 and early 2019; the former was a year of immense challenges and deep introspection. Oh survived appendicitis surgery, related complications, and six bereavements. He shares that, throughout that potent period, he thought a lot about family, relationships, mortality, and the fragility of life and time. “The sculptures in Material Index reflect the frames of mind and states of being I was in when I made them—they are intimate and emotional manifestations of personal stories, life- changing moments, and precious memories that I’m afraid to lose.”

You've also been naughty lately! (2018)

A different kind of love (2018)

Memory's DNA (2018)

Social Justice, BLM, and Atlantika: Billy Friebele and Yam Chew Oh

“Random Access Remix of ‘The Three Dimension of a Complete Life’ by Martin Luther King, Jr.,” Billy Friebele, 3D PLA Print from 3D scan of a bust of Martin Luther King, Jr., arduino, thermal printer, hardwood, hardware, 2016.

The year 2020 made us breathless. It unexpectedly brought together a deadly respiratory pandemic with George Floyd’s plaintive cry, “I can’t breathe.” We are witnesses to an ongoing catastrophe in which more than 805,000 people have already lost their lives around the world, including more than 176,000 in the US, with a special concentration of loss in communities of color. We also witnessed worldwide protests against the murder of George Floyd and the many others who have lost their lives as a result of racist violence.

Now there’s a question everyone should be asking themselves. The pandemic continues to threaten the entire world but especially poor and minority communities. The protests, although they continue, have died down a bit. What will each of us do to help the world breathe? To end racism, to safeguard Black lives, and to create a lasting movement toward social justice? After all, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. himself believed that the fight against racism is inextricably connected to one for social justice.

Atlantika Collective was formed not only as a means to engage collaboratively with artists, writers, curators, educators and thinkers, but to take a stand on “social responsibility, community, and nurturing a contemporary humanism through art.” Of course, none of Atlantika’s members is laboring under the illusion that our contributions will in and of themselves turn the tide on racism or social justice. However, we do perceive that, if each and every one of us who cares about the future finds a way to make a meaningful contribution, the results can be transformative. 

That’s why, in the weeks ahead, we’ll be sharing projects that Atlantika members have already created that focus on fighting racism or agitating for social justice. This new series, Social Justice, BLM, and Atlantika, is an effort to assert that these issues matter so much to our common future that they must continue to be a focal point for the foreseeable future, beyond the current round of protests and beyond the 2020 election. It signals a renewed commitment on the part of the entire Collective to make this subject a lasting focal point -- and to do our part to bring about a powerful worldwide movement for change.

In this first post, we explore the common ground between socially conscious works created by two Atlantika members whose work is often expressed through sculpture: Billy Friebele and Yam Chew Oh. 

Artwork by Billy Friebele and Yam Chew Oh, text by Mark Isaac

When Atlantika members recently began to discuss racial and social justice as a group, we quickly found an unexpected harmony and dialogue between two sculptural works created by members Billy Friebele and Yam Chew Oh. Both works are focused on issues of racial harmony, both involve the use of sculptural busts, both are based heavily on a prominent written text, and both were created in 2016. 

Billy Friebele’s piece, created during a residency at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, DC, in 2016 combines a 3D print of a bust of King with a machine that allows viewers to press a button and receive a printout of a random portion of his sermon, The Three Dimensions of a Complete Life, delivered at New Covenant Baptist Church, Chicago, Illinois, on April 9, 1967. In an interactive experience, viewers can tear off a random part of the speech and take it away with them as a reminder of what King had to say about creating balance in one’s life between self-interest, the welfare of others, and attention to the spiritual. In this speech, King eloquently suggests that a life lived only to advance the self is woefully incomplete, and that humans find their full expression only in reaching out to others and to God.

Installation views of “Random Access Remix of ‘The Three Dimension of a Complete Life’ by Martin Luther King, Jr.,” Billy Friebele, 3D PLA Print from 3D scan of a bust of Martin Luther King, Jr., arduino, thermal printer, hardwood, hardware, 2016.

Yam Chew Oh’s work is similarly based on a famous text -- in this case W.H. Auden’s poem titled, September 1, 1939, composed during the first few days of World War II. The poem was disavowed by Auden, who both altered and removed its most famous phrase, “We must love one another or die.” But it gained an ardent following despite Auden’s misgivings and has become a popular favorite, and one of the most famous poems dealing with the subject of war. It’s lasting impact was evident when it was often invoked in response to the attacks of September 11, 2001.

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We must love each other or die, Yam Chew Oh, mixed media, 16 x 18 x 20 inches, 2016.

In Oh’s sculpture titled “We must love each other or die,” two busts, one black and one white, face each other from less than an inch apart. Placed on a common platform split in the middle, they resemble giant opposing chess pieces confronting each other with heads tilted back in an eternal standoff. And yet, linked with thin strings in a rainbow of hues that inextricably bind them together, they are also drawn to each other and appear on the brink of a kiss.

King’s 1967 sermon focuses extensively on the importance of providing aid and sustenance to others. “Somewhere along the way,” he admonishes, “we must learn that there is nothing greater than to do something for others.” 

We must love each other or die (detail), Yam Chew Oh, mixed media, 16 x 18 x 20 inches, 2016.

Auden’s poem is mostly filled with a lament concerning the pathologies that have led to the advent of World War II, but it ends with a plea that he, among those who yearn for “the Just,” may fulfill some higher purpose: 

May I, composed like them

Of Eros and of dust,

Beleaguered by the same

Negation and despair,

Show an affirming flame. 

So both of the works by Friebele and Oh, finding inspiration in cultural masters, represent a calling to our higher selves. And in the context of current events, there can be no loftier aspiration than that of contributing to racial harmony and social justice. Although powerful forces relentlessly try to draw us away from this goal, we are only fully realized when we pursue it. And despite those who repeatedly try to draw us into conflict and separateness, we are only fully human when we embody love.

Paragon of Piety

Yam Chew Oh

In my sculptures, I employ the physicality and metaphorical potential of found or used materials to tell personal and familial stories.

My late father was a karung guni man, the Singapore equivalent of the rag-and-bone or junk man. [1] Growing up helping him with his trade had a deep impact on my love for ordinary and humble materials.

My mother had a hard life. She left Malaysia at 14 to work in Singapore so that she could help to support my grandparents, who were so poor they had to sell and give some of their 13 children up for adoption, and let a few of them die because they could not afford medication.

The Vow, acrylic paint on Post-it, anniversary bouquet ribbon, used grocery packaging, found wooden stick and metal mesh, and pin. Approx. 40 x 13 x 2 1/2 inches, 2018.

Mom is illiterate because my Grandpa felt that education was wasted on girls. But, my Grandma wanted Mom to “at least know how to write [her] own name,” so she sent her to a village tutor. Sadly, Mom gave up after a few lessons because she could not bear to see Grandma fending off lewd advances from lecherous village men the many nights she walked miles (with an oil lamp strapped to her forehead for light) to pick Mom up after class.

At 28, Mom married Dad, then a bread seller. We lived in an attap house [2] with my cousins and their four families. Mom bore Dad seven children and, even though she was trained as a seamstress, took on for years the bulk of the child-rearing duties while helping him with his odd jobs, as well as the back-breaking responsibilities for the family's pigs and poultry. When Dad had his first stroke, Mom was his sole caregiver for years. Nineteen years after he died from his third attack, Mom remains Dad's loyal widow—to remarry is unthinkable for someone who was raised to abide by age-old traditions; to question them would be sacrilegious. Mom is the exemplary "twenty-four paragons of filial piety wife” (二十四孝妻子), steadfast and unwavering in her duties as wife and mother. She wants her children to speak her late husband’s dialect (Hokkien) instead of hers (Teochew) because we must honor Dad - the patriarchal line - even though he is no longer with us.

The laundry handicap, used laundromat hangers and foam protective packaging, found bike bottle cage, dimensions variable, 2018.

I wish Mom could relax and enjoy her golden years, but to chill out and put her feet up are alien concepts to someone who has lived an arduous life bound by selfless duty to her family, and trapped under the weight of tradition, superstition, loyalty, and honor. She is helplessly preoccupied with the banal chores of daily living, such as laundry. I am still trying to comprehend why she could not just “let go” and not be consumed by housework and perpetual worries for her seven children, their six partners, and her four grandchildren. Even though Mom is incredibly resilient for her age and slight build, I worry for her when I think about how much more she could tolerate in her grueling life. Thankfully, she is beginning to understand the importance of self-care; the pandemic has impressed upon her a sense of urgency.

I have nothing but profound admiration and love for this amazing woman—without the privilege of an education, how she has managed to navigate this world for the last 76 years, with seven children in tow, is a miracle to me.

The widow’s lot, used cardboard photo frame corners, found mirror backing and scrap wood, 32 1/8 x 21 2/8 x 3 1/8 inches, 2018.

[1] The karung guni man is the Singapore equivalent of the 19th century rag-and-bone man in the UK, who scavenged unwanted rags, bones, metal, and other waste from the towns and cities where they lived and sold them to merchants. In America, they are called junk men, and in many developing countries, waste pickers. Karung guni are the Malay words for gunny/burlap sack, which was used in the past by Singapore karung guni men to hold the used newspaper they collected for resale. 

[2] The attap house is a traditional dwelling named after the attap palm (commonly known as the nipa or mangrove palm), which provides the wattle for the walls, and the leaves with which their roofs are thatched (the craft of building a roof with dry vegetation).

Exquisite Corps: Atlantika Edition

About Exquisite Corps: This is the Atlantika Collective edition of the original “Exquisite Corpse.”  Invented by surrealists, it is a method by which a collection of words or images is collectively assembled. Each collaborator adds to a composition in sequence, either by following a rule or by being allowed to see only the end of what the previous person contributed. More here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exquisite_corpse.

Six people involved with Atlantika Collective have participated in Exquisite Corps in the following order: Billy Friebele, Gabriela Bulisova, Michelle Frankfurter, Jessica Zychowicz, Mark Isaac, Yam Chew Oh, and Todd Forsgren. The following text has also been created organically by the participants to accompany the piece.

A game began 100 years ago 

Players creating generative collaborative compositions

who are they?

what about their stories?

every bit,

E very bit,

e  v  e  r   y      b   i   t,

ponde r

pondr

rednop

.

.

.

.

Open close

The door swings on its hinges

                   closer in and then out.

They are all alone together again.

Just sitting there, smoking in the rain. 

Red sky at morning.“Sing a song of sixpence.”

The sparrow pecks at the windowpane.

Not this again.

Magnifying glasses for spectacles,The doctor pulls the numbers up like weeds in a field of wheat.

“A pocket full of rye.”

angle yourself really close

pinch the glove 

because that is  

down the hand 

how you can look 

important thing

perform hand hygiene

some distance away 

use soft boxes 

with interlaced fingers

absolutely the way

perform hand hygiene

from the skin 

without touching the skin 

slide the fingers

between the glove

of the forearm

perform hand hygiene

moment in time

find the perfect

turn inside out

skin of the wrist

perform hand hygiene

start things off 

allowing it to

bag or bin

and natural light

perform hand hygiene

away from the hand thus

folding it over the first 

lit from underneath

medicines and food 

palm to palm

perform hand hygiene

a big window

and vice versa

remove the second

mindful of that

in the gloved hand 

perform hand hygiene

hands with water

hold the removed 

folding it over 

light is to go

tips for doing

perform hand hygiene

here’s something 

wearing technique

opposing palms 

do the magic

rotational rubbing

perform hand hygiene

you’re not alone

separate bathrooms

fingers interlaced

fingers interlocked

always really happy

perform hand hygiene

turn off faucet

helpful for me 

find good lighting

find my magic spot

you’ll be like, wow

your hands are now safe

Staring at the screen, 

Pacing around the apartment,

Looking at the horizon,

One moment I’m overwhelmed,

The next I’m bored to death.

Flip flop flip flop flip flop repeat.

But strangely, the silver lining,

Is that some relationship flourish,

From a medium distance.

:)

Slow

Down

…

I n — h a l e

E x — h a l e

…

Beautiful corps

…

I am sitting in a room, different from the one you are in now….