[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/singapore\/empowering-communities-through-the-arts\/#NewsArticle","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/singapore\/empowering-communities-through-the-arts\/","headline":"Empowering communities through the arts","name":"Empowering communities through the arts","description":"The second and last installment of this two-part series explores how artists in Singapore use their work to further social change and empower others, working with marginalised communities, to aid, for instance, in the healing process. TheHomeGround Asia also delves into the difficulties and challenges these artists face. The first part of this series can […]","datePublished":"2021-04-06","dateModified":"2022-04-16","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/author\/Maisie%20Leong\/#Person","name":"Maisie Leong","url":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/author\/Maisie%20Leong\/","identifier":227,"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4f5c852853ba8ed19bedc5417be7db8166064cfcb8857f5ec40bb516fab94b2d?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/4f5c852853ba8ed19bedc5417be7db8166064cfcb8857f5ec40bb516fab94b2d?s=96&d=mm&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"TheHomeGround Asia","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/photo_2021-07-22-222533.jpeg","url":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/photo_2021-07-22-222533.jpeg","width":640,"height":640}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/1617690655834_Jasbir_John_Singh_Artists_Pt_2_Featured_Image_1080x626.png","url":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/wp-content\/uploads\/1617690655834_Jasbir_John_Singh_Artists_Pt_2_Featured_Image_1080x626.png","height":626,"width":1280},"url":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/singapore\/empowering-communities-through-the-arts\/","about":["Community","Health & Wellness","Local","Singapore"],"wordCount":2175,"articleBody":"The second and last installment of this two-part series explores how artists in Singapore use their work to further social change and empower others, working with marginalised communities, to aid, for instance, in the healing process. TheHomeGround Asia also delves into the difficulties and challenges these artists face. The first part of this series can be found here.With many artists using their work to further social causes, the arts have proven to do more than influence perspectives. In some ways, it has helped people to heal, such as through art therapy.\u00a0Artist Dawn Kwan, 24, is pursuing a Master\u2019s in Art Therapy at the LASALLE College of the Arts in Singapore. She has also embarked on a work attachment with Project X, which provides aid and support to sex workers.\u00a0Through her involvement with Project X, Ms Kwan endeavours to reach out to the sex worker community to understand it from their perspective, and to learn about issues such as how people in this line of work negotiate and cope with shame and trauma.\u00a0\u201cI do what I can to go for outreach to talk to the community,\u201d she explains. \u201cEven if I\u2019m not [a] part of the sex working community, at least I\u2019m able to understand them on a deeper level, not just [from the perspective of] \u2018Oh, I want to help the cause.\u2019 But [to] really understand what kind of social issues they face… It’s not just donating money and saying that I did good.\u201d\u00a0Artist Dawn Kwan believes that art can help anyone, due to the versatility of art as a medium that can even transcend language barriers. (Photo courtesy of Dawn Kwan)Art therapy can benefit everyone, she says, including those with conditions such as dementia and disabilities, to people in a \u201cpreverbal stage or who are not able to localise their thoughts.\u201d\u201cThe main idea is that art has a transformative impact on people’s mental health, and [the] experience of art in itself can be very cathartic or grounding, or can help you [do things such as] regulate your emotions,\u201d notes Ms Kwan. \u201cThe whole idea of having psychodynamic art therapy is so that the individual can be led to either emotional regulation or better insights into their life.\u201dREAD: Creating change through the arts\u00a0Helping others to healChloe Chotrani\u2019s role as a soma practitioner at Soma Clinic has also given her the chance to help those with mild to severe trauma who are \u201cwilling to relationally deepen their healing process\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0She notes that trauma is experienced both as an individual and on a collective level, and that all people have \u201csome degree of trauma, both conscious and unconscious\u201d, which manifests as physical tensions due to \u201csignals of unprocessed trauma\u201d that exist in one\u2019s body, which are not always reasoned with or understood.\u00a0\u201cI encounter people who notice that their trauma often puts them into vicious loops of anxiety, or sensing residue of painful experiences of abuse, either as a child or even in adult life, and harmful relational dynamics that become a recurring pattern… which affects the way they live every day,\u201d she shares.\u00a0But healing comes as part of the artistic process for documentary photographer Jasbir John Singh, who feels that the people he has worked with on various photography projects, would have reached a level of acceptance in processing their personal experiences, in order to share their stories with him.\u201cFor somebody to have to sit down with me, a big cisgender male, they are [likely to] feel intimidated,\u201d he says. \u201cIt is often them reaching a point of healing or comfort where they can speak to us about things like this, although it is our responsibility to try and make sure that they know our intention, [such as] where the work is [going to] go.\u201dHealing artistsIn practising their art, artists also enable themselves to process their own personal experiences.\u00a0For instance, artist Rachel Pang\u2019s, of Rachel Pang Comics, experiences as an artist have allowed them to \u201ccrystallise\u201d a lot of the events that they went through, especially by articulating their experiences and framing them into \u201ccoherent narratives\u201d.\u00a0\u201cI think the process of creating art is also finding the right words to say and stuff like that is also helpful. When you’re in pain, one of the most helpful steps is to name the pain, articulate what it actually is [and] how it actually feels, [to] be able to trace it back to its roots and figure out how to make it better,\u201d they say.Rachel Pang at the Substation for its PiakPiakPlace Insta-Comic Competition, for which their entry was selected as a People\u2019s Choice Winner. (Photo courtesy of Rachel Pang Comics)Mx Pang shares that the validation they receive by putting their work online as an artist is another way to feel seen and connected, such as when they bond over shared sentiments and experiences with others.\u00a0\u201c[By] putting it online, people can be like, hey, actually, I experienced that too… [There is] this sense of solidarity and feeling like we’re not alone. So that’s been helpful,\u201d they say.\u00a0For Ms Chotrani, working with trauma requires a \u201cwillingness to do emotional labour\u201d, and to ensure that she takes care of herself. She achieves this by enforcing firm boundaries or having a strong support system, which builds her capacity to \u201chold the ground for others\u201d.She says, \u201cWorking this way has changed how I relate and respond to the world; especially how I hold myself, because this work is about holding, relating, and listening to people.\u201d\u00a0Empowering others through art\u00a0Having collaborated with people from all walks of life, such as those from the migrant worker and sex worker communities, in partnership with NGOs, such as Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME) and Project X Singapore, Mr Singh\u2019s photographic projects like Portraits of HOME have empowered his subjects by showcasing an alternate perspective of marginalised communities.\u00a0Jasbir John Singh believes that more artists should push for change to feature \u201cvery underrepresented voices that should be heard.\u201d (Photo courtesy of Jasbir John Singh)Mr Singh shares that the domestic workers he spoke to think that media representation tends to focus on \u201csuccess stories\u201d and controversial issues pertaining to their community, rather than the ordinary moments in their lives, such as their dance sessions with one another.\u00a0Hearing this sparked his interest to explore a different perspective of them.\u00a0\u201cIn [Portraits of HOME] we try to concentrate on who these people are, outside of them being just migrant workers. Yanti [Istriyanti], for example, she’s a photographer [in addition to being a domestic worker],\u201d he elaborates. \u201cIt was very interesting to see that these people who live in Singapore, who do our chores, clean our houses, cook for us, [and] to a certain extent, educate our kids, actually have these talents outside of their main responsibilities, that are outside of the main reason why they are here. And I feel it’s very wrong that these talents are not being explored.\u00a0\u201cAt the end of the day we have to look at it [from] a regional standpoint; artists in Singapore are already pretty misrepresented. When you think of a migrant artist, it’s even worse.\u201d\u00a0READ: International Women’s Day: Abused but unbeatenWhen asked whether his photography has made art more accessible to the public, Mr Singh opines that art is already accessible, be it through online platforms such as YouTube and Instagram, or even via Google. Instead, he suggests that photographers can feature underrepresented voices in their capacity as a \u201cmouthpiece\u201d to draw awareness to these voices.\u201cI think sometimes the story becomes the particular figure [of a celebrity or photographer or an artist]. I think sometimes we give more importance to who they are and what they are doing, versus the actual subject, which is the people that they are trying to represent. So that’s where perhaps on the ground, artists like ourselves, where instead of making our work the subject, we try to use our work and make [the people they are trying to represent] the subject,\u201d says Mr Singh.\u00a0Aside from uplifting communities, empowerment through one\u2019s art also occurs on an individual level by inspiring and comforting others. Take 38-year-old lawyer and photographer Dharma Sadavisan, who shares that his experiences as a guitarist with the now defunct band West Grand Boulevard led to more connections with others that have lasted till the present. He says that people have reached out to him to tell him that his band\u2019s music helped them through difficult times.\u00a0\u201cI would say music and photography isn’t always done for the primary purpose of helping people. But I think that the real connections it creates do bring people together and help people through hard times,\u201d Mr Sadavisan says. \u201cI’m still in touch with people who followed [West Grand Boulevard] 10 years ago. And some of these people are now all over the world. We still catch up when they’re in town. There’s still these connections that persist.\u201dFor Dharma Sadavisan, art is both a form of self-expression and a platform to connect with others in a way that \u201cwords don’t quite express properly\u201d. (Photo courtesy of Dharma Sadavisan)His experiences as a commercial and portrait photographer have also encouraged him to adopt a role that supports others: \u201cI like taking photos of people, because I like sharing that moment of connection with them… If I’m doing commercial projects, I’m trying to help them present themselves or their products in quite literally the best light possible.\u201dHe adds, \u201cI think that’s true for any kind of supporting role, and that’s what that’s what I like \u2013 supporting people in their journey towards pursuing their dream. That gets me hyped up.\u201d\u00a0Mr Sadavisan shares that photography also provides a platform for social commentary, adding that he makes an effort to do street photography as there are occasions where these photographs compel people to question and reflect on social issues.\u00a0On how the local arts community has evolved in terms of creating awareness about social causes, he says that while he cannot speak for the entire local arts community, his sense is that it is driven by the need for self-expression, “with social commentary (if any) expressed in the artist’s own unique way.”A garbage collector Dharma Sadavisan encountered with his friends in 2018, which prompted him to question “whether a meritocratic society ought to value its members based on the nature of their work as an indicator of merit.” (Photo courtesy of Dharma Sadavisan)Social change can also broaden people\u2019s perspectives, which Mx Pang aims to achieve through their art. They explain that they hope to encourage people to be more compassionate in approaching one another, and to look at things from a different viewpoint than what they have been taught.\u00a0They share, \u201cI always say that I draw comics for myself, and that’s part of it. But then I guess I also hope that like other people who read my comics can be introduced to different ways of seeing the world… and [to] challenge their assumptions in the dominant narrative of what we’ve grown up with.\u201d\u00a0The challenges of being an artist\u00a0While pursuing art can be deeply fulfilling, it also comes with its fair share of challenges.\u00a0Ms Kwan says that the constant expectation of her to push boundaries and create art that surpasses her previous works can be overwhelming and at times, counterproductive. She explains that the process of creating a work of art from \u201ca very authentic place\u201d can be difficult, as one has to take factors such as the material and opportunity cost behind failure into consideration.\u00a0“So the best and hardest part would be trying to manage this attitude of celebrating small wins, and telling myself that I’ve done well. And there’s another voice that says try harder, push yourself again. It’s this constant balance between attachment and detachment.\u201d\u00a0Constant rejections are one of the hardest things that Mr Singh, who identifies as a humanitarian photographer, has to face in his line of work: \u201cWhere there is trust and relationship, there [are] also misconceptions that come with the work that we do.\u201dHe explains that many people have an inaccurate understanding of the intentions of documentary photographers. The perception being that photographers approach these personal stories for their own gain, such as to bolster their portfolios.\u00a0But despite these hurdles, being able to continue to tell these important stories of humanity keeps him going: \u201cThe day I lose access to taking pictures, or meeting people and getting the opportunity to tell stories, is probably the day, there wouldn’t be any Jasbir John Singh anymore, because that is who I am… Photography has given me that identity.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0Join the conversations on THG’s Facebook and Instagram, and get the latest updates via Telegram."},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Destinations","item":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Singapore","item":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/\/singapore\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Empowering communities through the arts","item":"https:\/\/thehomeground.asia\/destinations\/singapore\/empowering-communities-through-the-arts\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]