Paintings and Paradigms

Featuring selections from artcommune gallery's presentation at ART SG 2025, the works on display share the common medium of painting and illuminate how these Singapore artists across different periods – from Modern to Contemporary – interrogate notions of traditions and seek ways to embrace or re-characterise the unique juncture between seemingly dichotomous values in their respective image-making process. Does a figurative landscape in watercolour or a portraiture in oil necessarily belong to the category of ‘traditional’? When looking at paintings, how do we evaluate this concept of ‘traditional’ in light of the knowledge that many of these artists living in contemporary times constantly reference and amalgamate traditions across time, space and cultures even while adapting them to formal codes and mediums of expressions?

'Paintings and Paradigms' will spotlight an exciting coterie of paintings by 9 artists, including: Cheong Soo Pieng, Ang Ah Tee, Boo Sze Yang, Chua Mia Tee, Ong Kim Seng, Tan Choh Tee, Tung Yue Nang, Tam Kwan Yuen, and Dominic Thian.