In Singapore, resilience lies at the heart of the nation’s efforts at building a strong civic culture. For those experiencing urban poverty, resilience holds little weight against the national rhetoric of self-reliance and meritocracy as keys to success. This paper presents a three-way conversation between the researcher, applied theatre facilitator, and youth participant, centring on the role applied theatre plays in examining the relationship between resilience and precarity within the cultural and political context of Singapore. It draws on Singapore’s national ideas of equality, justice, democracy, peace, and progress as touchstones to guide our reflection.

Critical and Creative Thinking in Contemporary Art Practice: Chiew Sien Kuan examines the state of art education in NAFA and questions the purpose of requiring teachers to ensure students master foundational technical excellence in fine art courses. Art Is a Marathon — Are We There Yet? Boo Sze Yang recounts his life as an art student, where fine art education is very much an apprenticeship; one remembers teachers vividly, from their quirkiness to their interesting teaching styles — very human and humane. Sze Yang recalls the days when teachers were free to express and sing in class and along the corridors. Students became free to express.

This article examines Han Suyin’s literary engagement and advocacy in late colonial/postcolonial Malaya (today’s Malaysia and Singapore). It traces her literary activities–research on local literature, creative writing, bi- and trilingual translation of regional literary works, and innovative teaching of contemporary Asian literature–and discusses her “dissenting voice”. An expatriate writer and high-profile international literary figure in Malaya in the 1950s and 1960s, Han Suyin involved herself in debates over the cultural blueprints drawn up by colonizers and nationalists, the definition of Malayan literature, the fate of the colonizers’ languages, and the relationship between writer and society, laying bare contested or hidden political agendas and touching upon such taboo subjects as the “Chinese problem” and emergent neocolonialism. These activities confirm Han’s role as a member of the mid-20th-century cosmopolitan intelligentsia whose non-aligned, independent voice represented a “third position” that had an impact on a series of major policy issues.

Benson Puah in dialogue with Renee Lee discusses institutional agendas and his personal belief in developing arts for all through thousands of programmes and events at the Esplanade Theatres, which Benson and his team developed into a People's Arts Centre.

This essay is a revised version, first published as “Constructing A Museological Paradigm of Living Cultures: The Making of the South Asia Gallery at the Asian Civilisations Museum, Singapore”, in Shivaji K. Panikkar et al. (eds.), Towards a New Art History: Studies in Indian Art (Essays presented in honour of Professor Ratan Parimoo), DK Printworld (P) Ltd, New Delhi 2003. Dr Gauri Parimoo Krishnan provides insights into the curatorial decisions she had to make in exhibiting Indian culture. A trained historian, she writes on issues and challenges, shedding light on how she developed the curatorial brief, design decisions and gallery display, which unfold the storyline and its experiential rendition in the South Asia gallery of the Asian Civilisations Museum.

In the early twentieth century, Chinese literati painting was embroiled in arguments on the relationship between ancient and modern or east and west. Therefore, the artistic practices of Wu Changshuo, Chen Shizeng, Qi Baishi, Xu Beihong and so on, were in response to this development. However, with the occurrence of World War ii and changes in the post-war situation, literati painting underwent further, new changes in different regions. This article intends to discuss the overseas Chinese painters Chen Wen Hsi and Chung Chen Sun as examples in exploring the new development of literati painting in Singapore and Malaysia in the second half of the twentieth century. Chen Wen Hsi was born in Jieyang County, Guangdong Province in 1906. He studied at Shanghai Fine Arts College and Xinhua Art College. He went to Singapore and held an exhibition in 1948. In 1950, he taught at The Chinese High School, and the following year also began teaching Chinese ink painting at Nanyang Fine Arts College. Chung Chen Sun, a native of Mei County, Guangdong Province, was born in 1935 in Malacca, Malaysia. In 1953, he entered the Department of Art Education of Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, which was founded by Lim Hak Tai. Chung was inspired by predecessors such as Cheong Soo-pien, Chen Wen Hsi and Chen Chong-swee who had pursued the Nanyang style. In 1967, Chung founded the Malaysian Academy of Art. Their styles of painting not only incorporate the Eastern aesthetics and Western theory but also include diverse elements. Their paintings wrote a new page in the history of literati painting during the Cold War era.

In the closing chapter of this section on Artists & Practitioners, Benjamin catches up for an interview with another high achiever, Terence Ho, in today’s fast-paced world.