. . . I begin with an encounter. Walking into the gallery located at the multidisciplinary art space called The Substation, we see individually framed photographs of familiar landmarks from around Singapore—the former Supreme Court that is being renovated into a new National Gallery; remnants of the colonial fort sitting atop Fort Canning Hill not too far from the gallery; the replica statue of an Englishman revered as the official founder of the city against a backdrop of commercial buildings, among others.1
Curiously, included in every image is a male figure, past middle age, often with his back turned or offering a side profile but never facing the viewer, looking at the scene within the image without anyone else in sight. There is a palpable sense of contemplation, or nostalgia even, for some distant past events—or perhaps being once caught up in those events but now standing apart. It...
