1. Dawn Ng, Artist
A marble block with text sandblasted on it (pictured below) is part of Dawn Ng’s year-long project exploring daily questions and answers between a child psychologist and herself. This marble block, with a list of words on it including “a bicycle”, “a song”, “a memory” and “a pair of scissors” was an exploration of the statement: “Put everything that you are inside a box.”
Known for her works such as Walter, the guerrilla installations of a giant rabbit that appeared against the landscape of HDB flats, and Bang, an installation done for the Facebook Singapore office which comprised 16,000 customised vinyl confetti stickers, Dawn considers her entire artistic practice as the creation she is most proud of.
“I don’t think there was an exact point when I decided to become an artist,” says the mother of eleven-month-old daughter Ava. “I was always documenting, writing and making things. I believe it’s the things you do compulsively, obsessively and relentlessly that define you.” After her double major in studio art and writing from Georgetown University and the University College London Slade School of Fine Art, she got her first job in advertising in New York. “I suppose I was always fixated by the craft of storytelling, which remains primordial in my work even today.”
She says that she has never kept to one medium, format or style for the very reason that she believes each idea, story and concept informs the manner in which it comes to life, not the other way round. “I personally enjoy this challenge of starting at ground zero each time I embark on a project. It’s both a humbling and thrilling process to master a new material or undertake a fresh modus operandi.” When asked what is the most rewarding aspect of her artistic practice, she says, “Making the intangible tangible.”