Tembusu College Fellow’s Tea

Shirley Soh

3pm, Thursday

12th Sept 2013

Master’s Common Lounge,

Level 3, Residential Block

Refreshments will be served.

Only 30 seats available!

Please register at tembusu.nus.edu.sg

Shirley Soh, currently an independent art practitioner, received her degree in political science and her Master’s in new media and communication, both at NUS.

In between, she obtained her fine art degree from Singapore’s Laselle College of the Arts. Shirley was a television journalist, covering local current affairs issues, then a corporate executive working first in Sydney, then London where she caught the art bug and decided to pursue a life in the arts. Her artmaking began with ceramics and her earlier work focused on making functional vessels for their symbolic and cultural representations of their usage. This quickly led to working with others material – living vegetation, soil, soft sculptures, soap and videos – reflecting on recurrent themes such as biodiversity and sustainability. Shirley also worked at the Singapore Management University developing and managing the university’s co-curricular education programme, but since 2010, has returned full time to art practice. She has worked with migrant workers and is currently collaborating with women prisoners on a project for Singapore Biennale 2013.

At this tea, Shirley will also be discussing her commissioned work for the Downtown Line Botanic Gardens station, earmarked to open in 2015. In this work, titled the Ontology of Trees, Shirley reflects on what it means to be a tree and is inviting poems or quotations to be included in the visual work for the new station.

Hosted by Dr. Margaret Tan