"MAPPING MACROCOSMS" A Parallel Project of Singapore Biennale 2016

The geographical world, in its many forms of representation, has long been a critical subject matter in art-making. Seen as a singular macro entity, as micro-realities that determine the whole, or through the diverse lenses of history, this world continues to capture the imagination of artists up to contemporary times. Mapping Macrocosms presents artists whose practices follow a keen interest in examining some of the systems and structures embedded within the defining of notions of place and space.

Featuring artists from the disciplines of architectonic design, painting and sculpture, each artist in Mapping Macrocosms provides a unique entry point of artistic endeavours that charts out and mediates pre-established notions of the experience ​of our lived environments, thereby presenting a new model for envisioning our world. Each presentation emerges from a distinct practice, and all the artists in the exhibition all employ their own particular means of measurement, assessment and interpretation of historical or scientific data to convert knowledge into an aesthetic experience.

Tawatchai Puntusawasdi’s (Thailand) works take the 13th century travelogue, Book of the Marvels (also known as the Travels of Marco Polo) as a starting point to investigate how historical mapping had determined earlier conceptions of the world.  The act of painting and the process of mapping intersect in Ng Joon Kiat’s (Singapore) works, providing us a broader scope, as well as an alternative visual language to perceive the geographies of urban landscapes. Philip Beesley (Canada) draws upon his research of interactive technologies that have the potential to reshape the future of living environment through combining artificial intelligence and nature.

A response to the Singapore Biennale 2016’s theme An Atlas of Mirrors, the exhibition extends the conversations and reflections surrounding contemporary artistic production seeking to present new perspectives of the world, and the many worlds that occupy within it.