GOFY returns with the second edition of For Art’s Sake (FAS) featuring 80 artworks by 63 emerging Southeast Asian (SEA) artists from Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia.
Reflecting the current cultural climate in the region, the artworks will be displayed at 21 venues across the island for everyone’s enjoyment and purchase from Oct 14 till Jan 28 next year.
As a lifestyle brand dedicated to bringing SEA urban art into your home, GOFY champions the region’s creative scene through exhibitions, infiltrations, and other initiatives. Additionally, it provides a platform for SEA artists to gain visibility across all communities, including those outside Asia.
This year’s edition pays irreverent homage to Western canon artworks, which have long influenced our media and culture. Besides providing a fresh perspective on buying, presenting, and circulating art, it also makes art more approachable.
Celebrating cultural roots
In reviewing the final 80 artworks, GOFY identified three narrative threads: celebrating cultural roots, sharing youth concerns, and expressing opinions about the region’s cultural landscape.
The prints were exclusively created for FAS using digital illustration, painting, mixed media, and photography. They play on the recognisability of reference artworks, including Gustav Klimt, Banksy, Edvard Munch, and Leonardo da Vinci, and are often playful and tongue-in-cheek.
By taking art out of a white cube or gallery space and placing it in locations across the island, it aims to make the works more accessible to enthusiasts and the simply curious. The prints can be purchased via a QR code on each artwork’s label, lowering barriers for budding collectors. Digital prints go for $80 and Giclée fine art prints, $300.
The 21 F&B, lifestyle, and entertainment venues hosting the exhibition include The Projector X: No Spoilers Bar at Orchard Cineleisure, Two Men Bagel House in Holland Village and Joo Chiat, Ave Float Club in Lavender, and Trapeze Rec. Club in Tanjong Pagar.
Highlights include Singaporean Sandy Ang’s piece The Creation of Morning Magic which references The Creation of Adam by Michelangelo (c. 1508-1512), portrays the coffee shop uncle as god, infusing vitality into our everyday lives with a kopi peng (iced coffee).
Reflecting the energy and camaraderie of the perfect last street supper before departing the city, PRAWR of Thailand’s Last Supper in BANGKOK Parts 1, 2, and 3 are influenced by Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper (c. 1495–1498).
Halik by Koalanov of The Philippines is an unabashed tribute to Filipino pop culture, swapping out Gustav Klimt’s lovers in The Kiss (c. 1907–1908) with icons of local cinema in what appears to be a still taken from a Videoke lyric video.
I Scream for AQI is Indonesian Salmoncartoon’s interpretation of Edvard Munch’s The Scream (1893), while Malaysian Cawand Dien’s It’s Just A Fckn Breakfast is influenced by Banksy’s The Flower Thrower (2003).
Jill Tran of Vietnam pays tribute to René Magritte’s The Son of Man with her Sale (of the) Man, a whimsical juxtaposition of blind consumerism sinking salary-people into weariness in contemporary Asian society.
Also happening…
In partnership with FAS 2023, SEA’s first intraregional AXEAN Festival featuring over 50 live music acts takes place at Goodman Arts Centre on Oct 28 and 29. Tickets are free with registration here.
For more information on FAS, visit www.gof—y.com. Sign in to its online store at gof—y.com/collections/prints; the artworks will only be available online for purchase just before the launch on Oct 14.
To view a map with pins of all 21 locations, click here.
