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‘Hi, I’m a miserable, Asian artist’

“If you needed to be miserable to be an artist, then Singapore would be the centre of the art universe.” Or so said Daisy Irani. Cheeky.

“If you needed to be miserable to be an artist, then Singapore would be the centre of the art universe.” Or so said Daisy Irani. Cheeky.

The theatre and television actress’ retort, a nudge-wink allusion to that infamous survey that put Singapore at the bottom of the happy-people pile, was in response to a light-hearted debate at the recent conference of the Association Of Asia Pacific Performing Arts Centres earlier this week.

The topic was “You have to be miserable to be an artist” and the team for the opposition — which included Irani, Edith Podesta and Charlene Rajendran — came armed to the teeth with data that proved it wasn’t so. A London School of Economics survey, for instance, revealed that, after sex and exercise, art-related activities such as going to the theatre or involving oneself in arts and crafts led to happiness. Another study showed how artists from 49 European countries had an average score of 7.7 on a “happiness” scale of 1 to 10.

The team for the proposition — comprising Nora Samosir, Zelda Tatiana Ng and Jeffrey Tan — more or less just reiterated how you do have to have a chip on your shoulder to be an artist. Needless to say, the opposition won.

You really can’t blame the proposition for coasting, though. The image of the artist as tortured soul is almost treated as a given. It’s a well-entrenched stereotype, with an exceptional glum-faced, tragic alumni of miserablists including Sylvia Plath, Vincent van Gogh and Sarah Kane, all of whom were name-dropped during the debate. Ditto for Anita Mui, Charlie Chaplin and Zhang Yimou. (I’d make a case, too, for the perpetually whiny Eminem and perpetually grumpy Morrissey.)

And, truth be told, if you hang around with artists in Singapore long enough, you’ll eventually find not a few Scrooges in the crowd.

The argument was, more or less, an essentialist stance, although it would have been nice for the proposition group to delve deeper into the whys of misery. Adversity, after all, has fuelled some of the greatest art produced. It could very well have been because of the Great Depression as it is because of personal depression; or about war as much as it is about battling personal demons; or as much about the miserable conditions of being an artist — economic or political hardship — as it is about being, well, grumpy or plain cuckoo.

Still, Rajendran was having none of that “woe is me” stereotype. “Anyone who wants to put a label on artistry doesn’t understand artistry,” she said with a huff.

The debate was, of course, all in good fun. But earlier that same day, there was a more pertinent issue dealing with artists and labels.

In his talk, Can We Be Less “Asian”?: Asian Performance Art Beyond The Nation-State, Malaysian academic Farish Noor shared his anxiety about the so-called “Asian artist”. For a region that’s so heterogenous, governments have nationalised and politicised culture and cultural production, he said, pointing out how, in South-east Asia, you can have spirited and fiery debates over which country can proudly claim “batik” as its own.

He added that the art market takes it to another level, as it expects a kind of “Asian-ness” from artists. Whether one’s a writer, film-maker or theatre practitioner, one is expected to “perform” that role of an “Asian artist”.

It’s an “epistemic trap”, he warned, before wondering if we can get out of having to be Asian in what we do.

It’s not that easy. Some of the big visual arts events in town, for example, capitalise on such identities. Art Stage Singapore’s slogan is We Are Asia, for instance; while the recent Singapore Biennale proudly flew the interesting-in-a-messy-way flag of South-east Asia. The Venice Biennale, too, is one of the biggest “culprits” — it’s an Arts Olympics where participating countries set up pavilions and everything is laid out in national terms.

The catch is that the currency in which these events trade on, contemporary art, has never really been confined to such old-fashioned boxes. And the works of previous Venice Biennale representatives such as Ming Wong and Ho Tzu Nyen do not really shout “Singapore art” as much as “really interesting art”. They could easily have been in any other national pavilion. The same could probably be expected of next year’s representative, Charles Lim, who interestingly deals with questions of (maritime) boundaries.

The moment Asian artists “decouple” with “Asian art” will be a good thing, said Farish. But it’s already happening, and the contemporary artist — working in whatever field — is in the perfect position to grapple with this issue. Yes, even as governments and the market hover in wait to pigeonhole the artist for their specific needs.

In the end, while artists are a product of a particular time, place and context, this doesn’t mean they should be shackled thus. That would be a rather miserable state to find oneself in, don’t you think?

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