THE NEW POSTER GIRL FOR SLOW ART:

SHAYNE PHUA SHI YING

Phua’s debut solo show at the Coda Culture gallery last October was titled Sehnsucht, a German expression that roughly translates to a deep feeling of yearning or missing someone or something, coupled with a desire for alternative experiences. Traces of such nostalgia can be found throughout her work. For example, her sculptures are formed using vintage moulds – the kind used to make pastries. Collecting them remind her of her grandmother who brought her up, says the 23-year-old. They also often sport Chinese symbolism as a nod to her family, who practises Taoism and Buddhism. “As we move towards science, logic and reason and cast spirituality aside, we run the risk of losing the wisdom of traditional practices,” she says. “Mysticism in moderation can teach us humility.”

The final-year student from the Glasgow School of Art certainly fits right into the Slow Movement camp. Each of her pieces takes over a month to complete and calls for up to three rounds of firing – all to create their lustrous hues and whimsical shapes and details that are her way of reacting against the minimalism trend. To think her earliest works were mostly in black and white. Of this phase, she says: “Most of the objects I encounter every day are quite flat, clean, machine-made and devoid of excessive colour, and that subconsciously influenced my idea of beauty – that beauty meant something pure.” Her evolution since has only proven that wrong: Most of her works from the Coda show sold out and her group show at Grafunkt at Funan Mall opens this month as part of Singapore Art Week.

“My works have to do with the idea of functionality, and the symbols and meanings of shapes and forms,” says Phua. Don’t pigeonhole her, though. “I’m all for ZEVMEFMPMX] ¾I\MFMPMX] ERH TPYVEPMX] - FIPMIZI TISTPI GSRXEMR QYPXMXYHIW ERH MRGSRWMWXIRG] WLSYPH RSX FI WXMKQEXMWIH ¯ EX PIEWX RSX MR EVX ² 4MGXYVIH EFSZI ,IV WGYPTXYVI 9 * 8EPMWQER [LMGL [EW MRWTMVIH F] XLI JSPOPSVI SJ XLI ERGMIRX WOMPPIH I\SVGMWX 7LM +ER (ERK JVSQ 8EM 7LER 1SYRXEMR MR 7LERHSRK 'LMRE

Much has been written about chef-owner Ivan Brehm’s brainchild, which opened on the second floor of an Amoy Street shophouse (above sister restaurant Nouri) five months ago. “We’re very much an in-between space: a restaurant, art gallery, R&D kitchen and vinyl library where we have over 3,000 records that cover everything from classic stuff like Ella Fitzgerald to also J-pop and Cantonese ballads,” says its resident art programmer Jean Ng. The fact that the space has a full-time art programmer tells you that it’s 100 per cent committed to its anthropological approach to weaving disciplines together – never mind that so far its food is what has been written about most. On-site art exhibitions