Sarah Choo Jing
Choo lives and works in Singapore since completing her MFA at the Slade School of Art in London, in the Summer of 2015.
Sarah Choo Jing (b. 1990, Singapore) is known for her interdisciplinary approach to photography, video and installation. Her work depicts identifiable moments and characters within contemporary urban society suggesting a plethora of private and often solitary narratives. The artist is concerned with the gaze of the flaneur, voyeurism and the uncanny.
ArtConnect asked the winning artists to share with us a glimpse into their creative life to get a sense of their personal inspiration and artistic process.
What are some of the central themes you pursue in your work?
My Art Practice has always been centered on social alienation and isolation. I have been fascinated with the relationships, or lack thereof, between people; and the potential narratives that occur in The Everyday. I am, as an artist, constantly interpreting from my direct environment and personal experiences, then re-presenting them as visuals.
How has your art practice developed over time?
With regards to the subject matter and context, people and objects are recurrent motifs through my pieces. In my earlier works, I often depict familiar individuals whom I have a personal relationship with, in my compositions. In my recent works however, I begin to find relevance in looking at strangers around me; to bring to attention, scenes which might commonly be overlooked. I’d like to think of each of my works being likened to coded journal entries. Each piece reflects an experience or a moment in time; focusing on different aspects of isolation in contemporary society.
Sarah Choo Jing in Studio
What are you currently working on or what's next?
Zoom, Click, Waltz is a multimedia installation comprising 13 LED screens. A culmination of documented events, staged recording and found footage, this artwork depicts individuals in various states of “performance”, while isolated within separate window frames.
What began as an attempt to communicate with neighbours during Circuit Break, developed into an imagined possibility of individuals connecting through dance. Over a period of 2 months, residents received mailed instruction requests to perform at an interval spanning 30 minutes. These recordings were at times effective, others, futile.
Various subjects’ responses range from active to passive; with individuals participating in modes of conscious performance, and others nonchalant, in contemplation.
Installation view of Zoom, Click Waltz by Sarah Choo Jing, click here to watch the video
Juli Cordray
Curator
“Sarah Choo Jing integrates elements of performance and installation quite seamlessly with video and photographic media. Zoom, click, waltz, for example, extends the architecture of the images into physical space, producing an immersive environment that begins to close the distance between the isolated subjects and the viewer. In works created during the coronavirus lockdown in Singapore, Choo manages to highlight simultaneous though solitary moments, while generating possibilities for physical connection -- primarily through dance and movement. Here, she reveals the uncanny and the polyphonic at the threshold of public and private space -- enabling a convergence of coexisting narratives that resists becoming static or uniform.”
Julia Hartmann
Curator
“Sarah Choo Jing’s multidisciplinary installation Zoom Click Waltz could not be more timely. While the protagonists in the piece are sharing intimate moments in their homes, the viewers are invited to walk through a forest of balconies, peeking into the window frames. What they encounter are people dancing, lingering, hiding—a narrative of serendipitous yet distanced encounters with what seems to be strangers yet we know they are neighbors. Especially during quarantine and lockdowns, when at times people’s only social connection happened on balconies, this piece susceptibly tackles isolation and alienation and offers new possibilities for building relationships through the body language of our neighbors.”
Sarah Choo Jing setting up her installation
What drew you to work with your medium/media of choice?
I have always believed in choosing the most appropriate medium/method to best convey the intention(s) behind each work. Taking into consideration the physical resources and context of the work, I make considered choices and decisions along the process of making. Aptly put by Marshall Mcluhan, “the medium is the message” indeed.
I was first trained as a painter before I moved towards exploring photography as a medium. I suppose, I began to see a relationship between photography and painting as I was often painting from photographs themselves. As I began looking at photography and what it could represent, my experience as a painter spilled into the digital images that I began to make. Hence, the painterly aesthetic present in my body of works - including video installations.
What are the biggest challenges you’ve faced as an artist?
The decision to pursue art making as a career comes with its fair amount of anxiety. A creative’s journey, is in itself filled with immense pressures, at various stages of the process of creation. The very instant I decide to embark on any project, there is an inevitable and overwhelming amount of self doubt and hesitation This is, of course, coupled with excitement and adrenaline. The fear in and of art-making, is ever present. Yet, the tension between ‘art-making- and this ‘fear’ needs to be negotiated.
See more of Sarah Choo Jing’s work
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