The polarity between the sensational and the mundane is also the dichotomy between the sensational and the sensory in which the latter is left unmarked, unvoiced and unattended to, as a banal element of the everyday.

-Nadia Seremetakis

Sunday, May 10

The Ambiguous ‘Alternative’: a Method to Narrative Others



i am one of the curators for this exhibition. opening 15 may 09 @ the NUS Museum, Singapore. below is an excerpt of my curatorial. 

Conventionally, our idea of the ‘alternative’ is one that is thought of as held in juxtaposition to an ‘other’, as a subversion, or as a dichotomy to the official, the formal, the State-owned. This is however, no longer a viable approach, as narratives do not exist as a duality. It is no longer one or the other, but one or the many others. Experiences of a singular event, entity, or moment in history can be multiplied manifold, sparking the existence of a multifarious range of stories, narratives. Water, for example, is no longer seen as merely an essential for living (drinking, agriculture), or as nature (in relation to man), but it was also once thought of as symbolic of conquest, discovery and freedom (travel, Colonization), and in more contemporary times, disaster and death (tsunami). To merely engage in the process of subverting ‘official’ narratives would deem the content produced inadequate in representing the diverse narratives that exist. Instead, we are forced to engage in a more nuanced approach to the ‘alternative’. 

1 comment:

  1. I am from Bulgaria...right now I'm really out of money, but as soon as the time travel is discovered this will be one of the events that i would love to see!
    I wish Nurul luck and a lot of smiles and lots of new friends.


    A.

    ReplyDelete