WEAVING INTO THE FABRIC OF EVERYDAY LIFE

Jackie Yoong, senior curator at Asian Civilisations Museum, believes capturing the attention of young people is the key to cultural longevity.

Jackie Yoong recalls how no one went to local museums when she was in school. They were regarded as old, dusty and irrelevant. It was different overseas. Parents would make a day of visiting ageold institutions like the MoMA or the Musee d’Orsay with their children.

Thankfully, Yoong is happy to report that 12 years after she joined Asian Civilisations Museum, that notion is finally beginning to change. “We have to resonate with the local audience,” the senior curator tells us. “We are engaging with young people more and have worked closely with the Ministry of Education on programming. More students now know that museums are accessible and have fascinating things.”

The pandemic has also made museums more digitally savvy, allowing them to stay on top of cultural trends. Yoong is currently working with her counterparts at the Royal Ontario Museum to contribute face masks and other relevant knowledge for an online exhibition about the most popular clothing item since the pandemic. Set to open in November, it aims to contextualise the pandemic by highlighting the important role played by face masks.

In the past decade, Yoong has also witnessed new museums sprouting up and older ones going through much-needed renovations. Internally, museum staff have also worked tirelessly to capture the public’s attention. From cutting long bits of information into bite-sized snippets that can be easily digested on social media to making museums Instagrammable, Yoong and many of her peers understand that keeping the young interested is the key to Singapore’s cultural longevity.

The art and culture scene today is also undoubtedly more vibrant, dynamic and international, thanks to initiatives such as the Singapore Night Festival.

However, she sounds a word of caution. “Youths tend to focus on the present, while museums emphasise the past. Even though we are innovating to meet them in the middle, we must not lose sight of our vision.”

As a result, Yoong genuinely hopes that the arts and culture scene in Singapore can be given the recognition it deserves by the public. Most museums and places of cultural interest here are currently government-funded. Yoong believes that museums will only remain sustainable if more individuals donate or become patrons.

In her travels for work, Yoong has seen how fundraising can help museums overseas integrate into the fabric of society and become part of everyday life. She believes that the same can be achieved in Singapore.

In June last year, The Sunday Times surveyed 1,000 participants and asked them to rank jobs based on whether they were essential to society. Unfortunately, 71 per cent considered the artist as the most non-essential occupation. Yoong understandably disagrees with this opinion. “Museums do not add to the bottom line. However, we do a lot more than that. We help you answer the basic question of who you are as an individual through our work. Museums are also fundamental to our everyday lives, and I hope people in Singapore will be able to appreciate that.”

“Museums do not add to the bottom line. However, we do a lot more than that. We help you answer the basic question of who you are as an individual through our work.”