New S’pore arts magazine The A List launched

SINGAPORE — Keen to find out what shows or exhibitions you can check out? Fancy bite-sized stories about the goings-on in the local arts scene? The National Arts Council (NAC) has come up with The A List, a new arts magazine to keep you in the know.

The first issue was launched last tonight (Oct 17) at the National Museum of Singapore. Aside from an extensive arts listing section, it also contains stories on the recent Cultural Medallion and Young Artist Award recipients, an opinion piece by theatre director Ong Keng Sen and feature profiles on The Diary Of Amos Lee author Adeline Foo as well as theatre group The Finger Players.

With print media veteran and playwright Michael Chiang as its editorial director, The A List will be published fortnightly by MediaCorp and distributed for free at cafes, arts venues and locations such as Changi Airport. The magazine can also be downloaded on its website, http://a-list.sg/. The website will also include a calendar of events and videos of events.

“There are, on an average, 60 arts and culture events every day. With so much going on, NAC has received feedback that there is a need for a ‘go-to’ place to read up and become more familiar with the scene and better appreciate the variety of choices of events that are available. There are a lot of hidden gems to be discovered,” said the arts council’s chief executive Kathy Lai.

With a budget of S$2 million for the next two years, the magazine is part of the NAC’s plans to address the area of arts advocacy and a response to feedback from the arts community on the need for more writing on the arts.

They will be banking on Chiang, who, aside from writing some of Singapore’s most popular theatre productions such as Beauty World and Army Daze, has also proven to have the Midas touch when it comes to magazines. Chiang was responsible for introducing the popular 8 Days and iWeekly magazines and rebranded the MINDEF magazine Pioneer, among others.

“There really isn’t an arts guide now that covers all bases. While there are regular arts listings in the press, as well as magazines like 8 Days, Time Out and IS, there isn’t one go-to source,” said Chiang. “And that’s our task: To try provide the most comprehensive arts and culture listings possible. We’ve devised different ways of sharing arts stories, so hopefully they will resonate with and appeal to time-challenged readers.”

There will be 12,000 copies per issue and up to 200 distribution points island wide including Sistic counters, community clubs.

Prior to the launch, artists and arts-lovers had expressed optimism about having a new publication on the arts. Said visual artist and poet Jason Wee: “Any new ongoing publication is welcome. I’m hoping to find that, apart from the usual profiles, announcements and listings, there will (eventually) be reviews, artist conversations and other critical writings.”

Avid arts-goer Meena Mylvaganam said: “With so much going on at any one time in the local arts scene, it’s very difficult to track what’s on when. This new fortnightly listing will hopefully make things easier, and I’lll be reading a preview instead of a review of something I had missed.”

Chiang did acknowledge the challenges that come with publishing an arts magazine. Currently, only semi-regular arts publications from educational and arts institutions, such as The Substation’s current publication, ISSUE, are making the rounds.

A whole slew of arts-centric publications to have come and gone, such as The Esplanade’s bi-monthly The Arts Magazine, which ran for seven years from 1997 to 2003. The Necessary Stage also published the journal FOCAS (Forum on Contemporary Art & Society), while artist collective Plastique Kinetic Worms had the quarterly Vehicle. The NAC, Singapore Tourism Board and TODAY previously published the arts event listing magazine Arts Xplosion.

Many of these titles had a good run but eventually folded due to financial or readership issues.

“The biggest challenge in working on an arts title is how to make it appealing,” said Chiang. “We don’t have showbiz gossip or a ‘fashion police’ to make pages sexy, so everything can turn deadly dull if all you offer are lengthy artist interviews or serious arts discussions. So we’ve used design to contemporise the feel, to make stories more visual and to energise the pages. Features will be kept deliberately short, with snappy little graphics and box-stories thrown in to make arts and culture less intimidating.”

He added: “The important thing is to first convince Singaporeans to pick up a copy of The A List, so that they can see for themselves how easy a read it is, and how it can help them discover and experience something new. If they like what they see, I envisage them reading future issues on their tablets and mobile devices. That is the greater plan - to make The A List as convenient and hassle-free as possible.

“We will be spending a lot of effort engaging readers online. I am pretty confident that if we’re able to provide enjoyable content and remain relevant and visible, we will be here for the long term.”