$20m multicultural arts grant: New panel wants strong artistic visions, better ecosystem

SINGAPORE – A newly formed 12-member panel will champion multiculturalism in the arts and advise on the disbursement of the new $20 million Multicultural Arts Programme Grant, the National Arts Council and President’s Challenge announced in a media release on July 15.

The President’s Challenge Multiculturalism Panel (PCMP) is co-chaired by Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth’s (MCCY) permanent secretary Teoh Zsin Woon and Lasalle College of the Arts president Venka Purushothaman, who tells The Straits Times his role would be to tease out different definitions of multiculturalism from the diverse panel spanning cultural leaders, arts educators and artists.

The other 10 panel members are Esplanade chief executive Yvonne Tham; film-maker Boo Junfeng; artist and former Singapore Art Museum director Susie Lingham; composer-in-residence for the Singapore Chinese Orchestra Wang Chenwei; Malay studies lecturers Azhar Ibrahim and Suriani Suratman, who is also a ceramic artist; Bhaskar’s Arts Academy director Meenakshy Bhaskar; theatremaker and founder of Drama Box Kok Heng Leun; co-founder of Nadi Singapura Riduan Zalani; and founder of Pasat Merdu Felix Phang.

The Multicultural Arts Programme Grant, funded by the President’s Challenge and the MCCY, opens for applications from July 15 to Sept 15. It offers funding of up to $500,000 for multicultural productions and up to $300,000 for ecosystem development projects. Successful applicants for this round will be notified by Dec 30.

President Tharman Shanmugaratnam said in a press statement of the grant’s objectives: “We are evolving our multiculturalism. It will have to grow naturally, not match a set template, as artists take forward their own traditions, create together, and sometimes even cross over to master another culture. What hopefully emerges in time will be a deeper, and distinctly Singaporean, multicultural identity.”

Co-chair Purushothaman says he is interested in how the concept of multiculturalism can be updated for young Singaporeans who still view multiculturalism as “an important compass” but also have their own “digital rituals”: “We must encourage young artists to explore the place of technology and artificial intelligence in cultural memory because they’re so embodied in the digital space – it’s almost an extension of who they are today.”

Esplanade’s Tham notes that Singapore artists are already deeply multicultural in practice, citing multilingual theatre productions and contemporary dance productions rooted in traditions such as bharatanatyam or Chinese dance. The more meaningful part of the grant, she thinks, lies in plugging gaps in the ecosystem – creating proper documentation of hybrid forms, fostering exchanges with regional artists and providing longer residency periods for artists to incubate new works.

She adds that the grant is likely to shape artists and presenters such as the Esplanade to be more consciously intercultural. Esplanade’s flagship festivals like Huayi, Pesta Raya and Kalaa Utsavam currently see about 20 to 25 per cent of audiences coming from other races, a figure she hopes can grow.

“In the first year or two of the grant, it may be worth giving more attention to the development side, so we don’t rush into producing – which is actually the instinct of Singaporeans as a whole,” says Tham. For productions, she hopes that works will not simply wear the “multicultural” label on their sleeve and instead convey a strong artistic vision that stands independently as artistic expressions.

Despite the name of the grant, Nadi Singapura’s Riduan emphasises that the grant also supports practitioners who want to have deeper engagement in a single cultural tradition. He says more attention is needed for lesser known or niche cultural forms within traditions of Malay melodic poetry (syair) or Chinese opera, for example, and given to sub-ethnic traditions of the Javanese, Bugis, Minangkabau and Orang Laut communities.

He is looking out for intergenerational and interdisciplinary projects, but ultimately ones that reflect Singaporeans taking ownership of their own culture. On his understanding of multiculturalism, he says: “We can be influenced by K-pop or hip hop or EDM but, ultimately, what does being influenced mean? It means that we can choose, pick, and form something that is truly ours.”

More details about the grant can be found here.

Correction note: This story has been edited for clarity.