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Untitled (Paperback Covers #01)

by Heman Chong

Project Description :

Untitled (Paperback Covers #01) is an art project that plays with the representation of literature via their covers. It is a site-specific work, which would be installed in Basheer Graphic Books, a prominent bookshop in Singapore. Basheer Books is well known locally for being one of the main suppliers of art, design and architecture books, and many people have a strong relationship with this place because of its position in the art scene as a distributor of information and ideas. It is also often a social space, where artists and designers and architects meet to browse through the latest books and magazines.

The books chosen are from a collection of science-fiction novels that are currently in my possession. Most of the titles that are chosen within these 50 novels deal with utopia or the lack of. The work can be read as a proposal for the space, where there is much possibility both for the bookshop and the gallery to perform the contemporary act of distributing ideas about the world and the individuals living in it. I personally feel that there is much to discuss about the relationship between commercial spaces like Basheer Books and the staging of art exhibitions, and perhaps this is a good start for the project.

Mode of presentation :

The 50 books will be framed in 5 different acrylic vitrines and mounted on the wall. This forms the installation concept of the show, which is created a wall of books within the space. This graphic representation of the work signals a working methodology seen in previous works, where several related and unrelated elements are presented as a complete whole, much like a map. This map forms a way of viewing that is done through an intense selection that is made solely by the audience, to create a personal map of the work, and also mapping themselves at the same time.