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Artist Heman Chong’s SAM survey whittles data down to visual aphorisms

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Photo of Heman Chong and two curators (June Yap and Kathleen Ditzig) at Singapore Art Museum, Tanjong Pagar Distripark on May 6, 2025

Photo of artworks (there is one that abstracts issues of The Straits Times, might be interesting to have that)

"This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness" reads as a survey of artworks by Heman Chong. From artworks first made in 2003 to new works,
the exhibition charts his prolific conceptual practice over the last two decades. An invitation into Chong’s incisive use of words, objects, situations, logics and affinities, the exhibition presents his critical and affective interrogation of our shared human condition in the 21st century.

39 Keppel Road, #01-02, Singapore Art Museum, Tanjong Pagar Distripark

Singaporean artist Heman Chong with his artwork Foreign Affairs #106 (2018/2025) (background).

ST PHOTO: KELVIN CHNG

Shawn Hoo

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SINGAPORE – Singaporean artist Heman Chong’s survey at the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) begins with a veritable textual barrage. Over 2,000 unread books in various languages are set against posters carrying 239 words from a failed meta-fictional novel and its stilted machine-translated Mandarin.

No surprise then that the exhibition’s title, lifted from a legal clause on Wikipedia, is a mouthful – This Is A Dynamic List And May Never Be Able To Satisfy Particular Standards For Completeness. These 16 words, printed simply on a banner hoisted above the reception desk, constitute the exhibition’s first artwork.

Artist Heman Chong’s SAM survey whittles data down to visual aphorisms

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