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Existing somewhere between a large podium and a diminutive stage, Platform II did not merely take on the function of a real object, recalling in this way the utilitarian works of Russian Constructivism. Rather, when guest-of-honour Dr. Ruth Wong opened the art exhibition at UWCSEA in 1976, one wonders if she felt a little uneasy as she was faced with these familiar and yet strange objects the most conspicuous of which was a fake microphone. Shaped in the manner of a large ice-cream cone, this artifice, with its associations of popular appeal and sugar-coating, enacted a parody in which the usual perfunctory or impassioned exhortations of its speakers were caricatured as so much embellishment, somewhat like the four bulbous objects decorating Platform II’s lower front, objects whose flowery and bloated surfaces the work aimed to deflate. Title devised by Library staff.
Additional Details
- Credit Line
- This digital copy (c) National Library Board Singapore 2008. The original work (c) Teo Eng Seng, 1976.
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