Curator Selene Yap (L) and artist Amanda Heng Liang Ngim (R) Illustrated by Maria Chen
DATE
2016/07/24
ARTICLE
Maria Chen
PHOTOS
Courtesy of Singapore Art Museum
Selene Yap on Curating Attention: Amanda Heng, A Pause and the Singapore Pavilion at the Venice Biennale
Singapore Art Museum curator Selene Yap discusses collaboration, curatorial practice, Amanda Heng's ‘A Pause’, and how slowing down became a powerful proposition for the Singapore Pavilion at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia.
Representing Singapore at the 61st International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, curator Selene Yap and pioneering artist Amanda Heng present A Pause, a pavilion shaped not by spectacle or certainty, but through years of dialogue, trust and shared inquiry. Together, they offer a quietly powerful proposition: that slowing down, paying attention and making space for reflection can become radical acts in themselves.
Rather than simply presenting Heng's work, Yap has worked alongside the artist to develop an exhibition that unfolds through conversation, experimentation and responsiveness to place. Installed within the historic Sale d'Armi in Venice's Arsenale, A Pause transforms the Singapore Pavilion into an environment where visitors are invited not only to view art, but to inhabit it. Through architecture, photography and moving image, the exhibition creates space for rest, observation and reflection, asking what might emerge when we allow ourselves to pause.
For Amanda Heng, whose four-decade practice has explored the body, identity, memory and everyday acts of care, A Pause represents both a continuation and an evolution of longstanding concerns. Together, artist and curator have distilled decades of artistic practice into a pavilion that privileges attentiveness over spectacle, demonstrating how seemingly ordinary gestures—walking, sitting, waiting and observing—can become profound reflections on how we inhabit the world and relate to one another.
That collaborative ethos extends throughout Yap's wider curatorial practice at the Singapore Art Museum, where exhibitions emerge through sustained research, long-term relationships and close attention to the conditions that shape artistic production. Rather than imposing fixed narratives, she develops frameworks in which ideas evolve alongside artists, allowing each exhibition to respond to its context, participants and environment. Her role is not simply to interpret artworks, but to create the conditions in which they can fully unfold.
In this conversation with CNTRFLD.ART, Selene Yap reflects on the collaborative process behind Singapore's Pavilion, building creative relationships grounded in trust, translating deeply local artistic practices onto one of the world's most visible cultural stages, and why attentiveness remains one of the most valuable qualities for artists, curators and audiences alike. More than an exhibition, A Pause demonstrates how artist and curator can work together to create spaces where audiences are invited not simply to look at art, but to slow down, participate and experience time differently.
