C42 ARTIST RESIDENCY: THE VAULT LITE

C42 ARTIST RESIDENCY: THE VAULT LITE – REHEARSALS FOR (IM)PERMANANCE

^{4th July – 7th July 2019}

^{CHERYL CHARLI AS ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE

Cheryl‘s personal reflection piece: > READ
Artist interview: > READ

In this artist residency, the play Rehearsals for (Im)permanence was a collaboration devised and written by Cheryl Charli with research by Isaiah Lee, based on local playwright Chong Tze Chien’s scripts ‘POOP!’ and ‘The Book of Living and Dying’. The proposed research title, ‘Reframing the Absurdism of Hell: Exonerating the Subaltern Syntax of Silence in Chong Tze Chien’s ‘POOP!’ (2009-10) for a Post-Pandemic Singapore’, poses the question ‘How does the relationship between absurdism and alienation, negotiated in Chong Tze Chien’s Poop!, reimagine an afterlife for trauma in post-pandemic Singapore?’.

Postmodern drama, which embodies an incredulity toward metanarratives and linear thought, confronts trauma through absurdism. In estranging realities from expectations, Chong’s work reconciles the rift between an initial position of trauma and a progression toward a future reality which must move on from that traumatic encounter. That is, Brecht’s alienation effect achieved in ‘POOP!’ reimagines ways of negotiating trauma in post-pandemic Singapore. Through a research process that looks specifically at voices of alterity and marginalised narratives in ‘POOP!’, we aim to devise a new work that responds to the negotiation of a new normal in a destabilised world after trauma.

In the process of writing this script, inspiration was taken from Buddhist philosophy and cosmology. In particular, the concept of death and the afterlife drew inspiration from ‘The Tibetian Book of Living and Dying’.}

^{ABOUT THE CENTRE42 ARTIST RESIDENCY

‘The Vault: Lite’ was an eight-week residency aimed at the creation of contemporary responses to Singapore Theatre classics. The pilot edition of The Vault: Lite saw five projects selected from an open call, each responding to a play of their choice.

Since January 2021, the artists-in-residence of The Vault: Lite — Cheryl Tan and Isaiah Lee, Ke Weiliang, Lim Si Hui, Lim Shien Hian and Ruzaini Mazani — have been exploring and experimenting with local plays along the theme “A Whole New World?”, inspired by monumental changes to human lives brought on by the Coronavirus pandemic since 2019.

At the end of the residency, the artists shared their ideas and interpretations of the plays through reimagined contexts, mediums and genres.}