the singapore river as a psychogeographical faultline

Last week I built a new site to collate links about projects which interest me:

BUILD! is a grid-style weblog about maps, art, architecture, non-places, urbanism, psychogeography, metaverses, transportation, technology, sound art, augmented reality, data visualisations, and other things which I love! This is a visual library of links to inspire one to build more things.

But then of course, I really must finish uploading the memories for Here the River Lies FIRST! I promise I will get on that before the end of November! I'm trying to get some other projects off the ground at the moment too!

Goodbye Substation Gallery! Thanks once again to all those who made my first solo exhibition possible and gave me so much help and support with this - The Substation, my parents, Effendy, Annabelle, Tania, Asylum, Emily & Chris and the rest of the team at Substation, Dominic, Hongda, KK, Steve Black, Lu Jia, Ah Fu, and all my colleagues at Redworks. Thanks must also go to everyone who gave me invaluable advice along the way - Martin, Andreas, Vladimir, Yanying & Bin! And thanks to my gallery sitters for their patience in monitoring the equipiment and helping to set up the somewhat complicated map table every single morning - Vicknes, Nell, and Marc.

\\ is now packed off and rolled up, hopefully to find another venue at which to exhibit again in the near future! Thank you to all who came down to see it! If you've left memories by the riverside, be sure to check back in a few days to see if your card is online at psychogeography.sg/river



Two days ago, one of my fan blades spontaneously broke apart after working tirelessly for almost a full month. The thing about computer fans is that if one blade breaks then the fan is rendered completely useless as a missing blade will cause too much vibration. So I had to amputate it. Poor thing. It does take a heavy toll on all the equipment...



I'll be updating the FULL documentation of all the memories in the next day or so, along with more on the technical setup while its still fresh in my mind! I will be drawing up some models of my setup on sketchup, which I am trying to learn to use properly for once. It is good to be working from home once again.

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on a geeky sidenote: after spending so much time at Substation,
I became Mayor of Substation on Foursquare....
come and oust me if you dare!

Yesterday Jiekai and his crew popped by to film some things at the gallery, including Debbie rambling on about Singapore River - he's working on a project about Singapore's prehistory. We were talking IP rights where historical material/maps are concerned, and he mentioned a book that sounded pretty interesting: The Makers and Keepers of Singapore History. I want to read that!

Later in the evening, I also recorded a video of some of my ex-colleagues playing with the table. Ridz, Leeyen, Jess and Michele were amongst the first people whom I asked to draw their impressions of the river - more than a year ago. Inbetween working intensively on all those flash banners and microsites, I decided to start collecting sketches from people around me. Some of my renderings were based on their sketches, so it was really interesting to see their responses to it!

\\ from Debbie Ding on Vimeo.

One full month of operating has taken its toll on the poor ancient Macbook inside, which was already slow to begin with, and now suffering a lag of a few seconds. Even Marc (who has been gallery sitting for me recently) has begun to recognise its quirks, like its habit of shutting down suddenly when its too hot. But at least it is still running!

LAST THREE DAYS!

《新加坡河: 人们心中的断辰线》
xin jia po he: ren men xin zong de duan chen xian



This is the chinese translation of my exhibition title. I gave a short talk about my work at a session called "Re-inhabiting the City" recently and the audience turned out to be more chinese-speaking than initially expected. Siew Ching and others helped to provide a running chinese translation for the session and this was their translation of the title!

I am also thinking that "心理地理学" might be an appropriate translation for "psychogeography". Would any superior chinese speakers like to comment on this!

Flipbook Catalogue

for \\ : The Singapore River as a Psychogeographical Faultline

Featuring an essay by Tania De Rozario
Designed by Asylum
Other Writing by Debbie Ding

Available at $16 from The Substation

Flipbook images depict the historical changes in the Singapore River from 1819 to present day, and also projects it into the future, into an imaginary flatline.

THE SHAPE OF THE SINGAPORE RIVER

part of the THE SINGAPORE RIVER AS A PSYCHOGEOGRAPHICAL FAULTLINE
at The Substation from 2-26 september

a series of 20 illustrations of the map of the singapore river, based on collected sketches made by people and what they think the shape of the Singapore River looks like, without making reference to anything else.

HERE THE RIVER LIES

part of the THE SINGAPORE RIVER AS A PSYCHOGEOGRAPHICAL FAULTLINE
at The Substation from 2-26 september

a psychogeographical game in which visitors can leave both real and imagined/mythic memories on locations by the riverside - a 1.5metre x 3.75metre handdrawn map of the Singapore River (with an isometric projection) and its surroundings - where visitors can also indicate which memories they collectively believe in, with small stickers. see what memories lie by the river, or add your own to the map!



after opening night



map of the river



memory cards



a bit like skyscrapers



in the gallery



"LKY Sighting"



"I BECAME A GOD" (at St Andrews Cathedral)



"Monster Creeper taking over the world one creep at a time"



"A Memory of Grandfather"



"She wouldn't come, but..."



"UFO LANDING" (mmm yes, that thing which landed opposite funan)

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Opening Night, 2 September 2010

Kevin Lim (Whattheart) took some great photos on opening night.
Click on the image above to see more images from his flickr set.
Thanks for sharing these pictures, Kevin!