Where art thou?
By David Chew, TODAY | Posted: 19 April 2007 0720 hrs
Ramon Orlina isn't what you'd call an emotional man, but earlier in his career the 63-year-old artist had good reason to cry and did.
His $300,000 work, Wings of Victory, made up of 67 suspended steel birds weighing 35kg each, went missing.
Having been displayed in the Wisma Atria atrium from the late 80s, Orlina's work was abruptly taken down by the building's previous management in the early 90s.
"But they didn't inform me and I only learned of its removal through a friend who was in Singapore," Orlina told TODAY earlier this week over the phone from Manila. "When I met up with them they said we own everything in the building and we paid for the work, so we can do whatever we want with it."
To his knowledge, Wings of Victory has never been seen again, and was presumably destroyed. When contacted, the current management of Wisma noted that it was most likely to have been destroyed, but because the mall has changed both ownership and management, they had no record of this.
Sadly, Orlina's experience is not an isolated one: Singapore-based artist Delia Prvacki's works at the Singapore Power Building recently suffered a similar fate. Four out of the six stoneware water features she created in 2001 were nowhere to be found last week when she visited the building. L ike Orlina, she wasn't consulted on their removal.
Created and installed at a cost of about $100,000, the works, together with a koi pool, were located in an area earmarked for platform lifts and ramps. These, Singapore Power told Today in a statement, are part of its plans to provide a barrier-free environment for elderly and physically-disabled customers.
It also added that there was a safety reason behind the removal. In recent years, there have been incidents of people falling into the pool.
Prvacki declined to comment as she is considering legal action.
Lawyer and art curator Lindy Poh said artists like Orlina and Prvacki have limited rights over such art works — "the people who commissioned and paid for it do own it" — but her feeling, and that of many in the arts field, is that professional courtesy dictates that they should have been informed.
After all, for a country that's striving for arts hub status, the increasingly common practice of demolishing valuable art works that took years to create doesn't seem like a step in the right direction.
Easy come, easy go
From Orchard Road to Toa Payoh, public artworks such as those by Prvacki and Orlina are a common sight — with over 300 such works in existence according to a recent National Heritage Board survey.
Recognising the importance of such public art, a Public Sculptures Committee was set up in 1988 to encourage the donation of public sculptures, while the first Public Sculptures Masterplan was drawn up by the Urban Redevelopment Authority in 1991 with the aim of taking art to the people.
It has done just that, turning works such as the iconic bronze sculptures — Contentment and Wealth by artist Ng Eng Teng — that stood in front of Plaza Singapura in the 80s into well-known landmarks. Even so, the sculptures were moved to the National University of Singapore in 1997, when the building was renovated.
At least they weren't destroyed, which is the fate of the mosaic tile mural outside the Orchard Road MRT station where the Orchard Turn Development is taking shape. Its artist, Leo Hee Tong, said he had not been informed of its imminent demise.
The price of progress? Sculpture Square general manager Tay Swee Lin doesn't think so.
"There is a historical value to these works as they become visual markers in the landscape," she said. "This city unfortunately has no memory, it's easy come easy go."
R-E-S-P-E-C-T
At the heart of the issue for Tay and others is respect for art and their artists.
Both Prvacki and Orlina noted they were open to suggestions if their works had to be moved. , Orlina cited the case of another of his works, Fertile Crescent, which once stood at Forum Galleria and had been earmarked for dismantling until he suggested that it be donated to the Singapore Sports Council.
Today, the $300,000 work is located in Kallang near the National Stadium. Similarly, the now-defunct Kallang Theatre, which was shuttered by the National Arts Council in March, also contains many public artworks for which the council is now searching for new homes.
Australia-based Singapore artist Tan Teng Kee, 70, told TODAY by phone that he was asked by the National Parks Board, who told him of its plans to move one of his sculptures from the Marina City Park to Toa Payoh, to make way for Gardens by the Bay.
"It's plain rude not to inform an artist even if the work is only meant to be moved."
Protecting art
In an effort to assert what they see as their right to help decide the fate of their creations, artists are now re-looking the contracts they sign to supply commissioned works.
Their goal? To ensure that they are informed of any changes to the works or of plans to relocate them.
"We have included this clause in the contracts we formulate for artists since 2003," said Sculpture Square's Tay, though policies such as this seem to be the exception and not the rule.
What's more, unlike Australia for example, Singapore doesn't have a national committee to look into finding new homes for public art that might otherwise be destroyed.
While stricter laws and increased Government involvement might help overcome the existing problems, Poh advised artists to do more to look out for themselves.
"I have corporate clients who are very progressive in their dealings with artists and who have agreed to share equal rights in the works," she said.
"Read the fine print. People in charge of organisations change, corporate policies change, so protect yourselves."
Preserve.
We bunch of singaporeans, no matter what our leaders say, are a bunch without much heritage. Dont lose the little that we have, or soon we've none to speak of.
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