The General Manager
“Every day, I had to think, where to get money.”
In 1989, Tan Beng Luan left her civil service job to join PPACL. She knew Kuo from attending his directing course a few years before. Overseeing the founding of The Substation, she recounts the fundraising challenges of the early years – a Straits Times article in 1990 reported that the arts centre had to raise $700,000 for its first year’s operations.7
The Substation operated in this way: it rented out its spaces for artists to use at very affordable rates, and also initiated its own programmes. Dance Space, Word Space, Music Space and Raw Theatre were all programmes created by Pao Kun to spearhead or explore new possibilities in artmaking. We had a 120-seat black-box theatre, a garden, art gallery, dance studio, two classrooms, as well as a meeting room and office. There was also an art bookshop and café. MCD allowed us to sublet our spaces to commercial tenants. The ministry gave Pao Kun the freedom to set the artistic direction for the centre and we never had to seek approval for any of our programmes.
While the government’s capital grant paid for the building, the money for equipment and fittings had to be raised by PPACL. And it was really very hard. Every day, I remember one of my administrators would receive a call from the contractor to ask for payment. Once, we couldn’t even find $800 to pay for the air-con instalment.
But we did have supporters. Our first fundraising event was supported by many visual artists who donated paintings to The Substation that we sold. Our salaries were supported by the Practice Performing Arts School, an entity under PPACL which was financially stable and had a regular income through its classes. Up until Guinness [the beer company] approached us in 1991, it was very hard to get corporate sponsorship. This was before the establishment of the NAC, and when it came to sponsoring the arts, companies were very cautious.
One day we were having a meeting in the office. Suddenly the door opened, a gentleman and a lady walked in. They asked to speak to the manager. So I said, “Yes, what is your business?” They were from Guinness and wanted to find out more about The Substation. I took them to the café downstairs, answered all their questions, and then they expressed their interest in sponsoring.
Before Guinness, there was another company which wanted to support The Substation. But the condition was to have naming rights over the entire Substation. Of course, Pao Kun’s reaction was, no, The Substation [had] to maintain its name; we can name individual spaces within The Substation after a sponsor but not the entire building. When Guinness came in, they wanted to support The Substation with $1 million over five years, provided the theatre was named the Guinness Theatre. That was okay.
Up to that point, everything went quite well. But when we were about to close the deal, there was a request from Guinness’ UK office to say that in the agreement, The Substation had to guarantee that no performances or activities take place there that will damage the image of Guinness. Pao Kun said there’s no way The Substation can make this guarantee; we would have to work out a system to scrutinise all events in detail before we even let artists use the space, and it just wasn’t possible.
There was a lot of “ding-donging” [back-and-forth]. I often heard Pao Kun over the phone, trying to persuade the Guinness representative in Singapore so he could in turn persuade the UK office. Eventually Guinness counter-proposed to change the wording to something like: “The Substation has no intention of creating any damages to the image of the sponsor.” That finally was okay.
I remember asking Pao Kun – what if Guinness drops this whole sponsorship idea because you disagree with their original condition. You guess what his response was? He said, “Well, then we start all over again and look for another sponsor.”
This ability to endure hardship and willingness to take a difficult journey is the character of Pao Kun.
I remember another incident. In early 1990, one of our board members, Mdm Li Lienfung [the late writer and vice-chairman of the Wah Chang group of manufacturing companies], called me. She had a friend who could be willing to occupy the gallery space for the entire year, which meant we could collect rental revenue. But I said the gallery cannot be rented out for a year because we won’t have the space for our [own] visual art activities.
So of course Mdm Li was very upset because she was really concerned about the financial situation of The Substation. But then, what to do? This issue about the strong artistic mission of The Substation – versus commercial usage and revenue collection – was a constant tension. You have to make a decision. For that same reason, it would never occur to Pao Kun to rent out the garden [as] it was the second biggest space after the theatre. I often say he led his team of board members through a difficult path full of ups and downs and hurdles. Fortunately, they were willing to come along [on the journey].