Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay Am I Here
Commissioned by Esplanade
Director / Eva TANG
Choreographers & Dance Artists / CHIEW Pei-shan & LIM Chin-huat
Movement Collaborators & Performers / Jo KWEK, Kimberly LONG, NG Mun-poh & Wendy TOH
Music & Sound Designers / Ferry & Vick LOW
・Duration：approximately 25 minutes
Home, is it permanent or fluid?
Home, a place that seemingly calls for one’s return. What remains of the traces of connection between people and spaces amidst the evolving environment spurred by development?
Perhaps, the moment of one’s birth begins the exploration of an inextricable web of connections. Embarking on an introspective journey, Am I Here? reimagines childhood memories to ponder on presence and absence in exploring the notions of home and familial relationships.
Main Creator
Director / Eva TANG
Life is manifested through all kinds of movements.
Like a wind-up clock, a single push drives the gears into a tick-tock rhythm, circling repeatedly to keep time for humans. From the moment we take in our first breath, to the moment when we let out our last breath, our bodies are orchestrated in a series of movements of our live journeys. We explore, we touch, we embrace, we attach, we detach, we vent, we hide, we gather, and we depart…… body movement is a language beyond words.
A house is like an extension of our bodies in motion. It encapsulates the sorrows and joys, separations and togetherness in a tiny space. Am I Here? observes life and death through a house, and ponders where do we go next.
I would like to thank Esplanade and Huayi festival for this commission. It is my first attempt working on a dance short film. Other than working with dance artist Chiew Peishan, I am also grateful to the theatre practitioners, Lim Chin Huat, Jo Kwek, Wendy Toh and Ng Mun Poh for their generosity and participation. This adventure has gathered people from the film and arts industry, I am looking forward to explore more possibilities.
Eva Tang was unanimously awarded Hong Kong Chinese Literature Award first prize for her prose, at the age of 21, when she was an undergrad at the University of Hong Kong. A journalist-turned-filmmaker, Eva pursued her Masters of Arts in Fiction Directing at the prestigious National Film and Television School in the United Kingdom. Her student film While You Sleep (2002) was the first short film by a Singaporean selected by the Venice Film Festival.Her debut documentary The Songs We Sang, premiered at The Esplanade Grand Theatre, was the first sold-out film at the 2015 Singapore International Film Festival. It has also set the box office record for Singapore documentary. The Straits Times rated it one of the Best Movies of 2015. It is honoured the 10 Best Films of 2016 by China’s popular film reviewer 桃桃淘电影(ttfilm) who saw The Songs We Sang at the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival.
Co-choreographer & Dancer / CHIEW Peishan
Am I Here? has been a journey filled with mixed feelings. It started from a personal story and got nurtured with an independent new life that steers away from the heart. It unearthed a delayed grief where closure is seemingly nowhere in sight. It attempted to give sorrow words, but discovers that some grief may yet speak. It desired to imprint memories within a family flat before it gets demolished, yet unexpectedly erases original traces of presence.
There are no regrets through this process of learning to accept the contradictions that make me human. I hope the work can invite us to connect with the shifting forms of absence and presence in our everyday life.
I am thankful to the Esplanade team for supporting the interdisciplinary collaboration, and appreciate the opportunity to explore and rethink the body and its expressions with Eva, Chin Huat and the team of artists.
Peishan is a dance artist and choreographer. She graduated with a Master of Arts in Contemporary Dance from London Contemporary Dance School, with the support of National Arts Council Arts Scholarship (Overseas). Peishan draws from her lived experiences to craft autobiographical fiction. Engaging the body as the central medium, her works explore the connections and tensions between reality and imagination, and situate in the in-between of subjective truth and inventive representation. She received commissions to create for Frontier Danceland, Re: Dance Theatre, T.H.E Second Company, Dance in Situ, as well as LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore Management University and National University of Singapore. Her works have been performed in Esplanade da:ns Festival and M1 Contact Contemporary Dance Festival in Singapore, as well as in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong.
Choreographer & Dance Artist / LIM Chin-huat
A cross-disciplinary artist, Chin Huat have worked in capacities of a visual artist, actor, dancer, choreographer, director, movement director, costume designer, production designer, educator to mentor. He is a recipient of the prestigious Young Artist Award conferred by the National Arts Council Singapore in 2000, as well as the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts Distinguished Alumni Medal. He is also the former co-founder and artistic director of ECNAD (1996 – 2013) and has an oeuvre of over 100 creative works, and is currently a senior faculty member of Intercultural Theatre Institute. He has also worked with various local arts companies, including Siong Leng Musical Association, The Arts Fission company, The Finger Players, DramaBox, Nine Years Theatre, The Theatre Practice, NAFA Dance Alumni Chapter, SIFA 2015, Nanyang Collective, The Substation and others.
His latest featuring performance in short film includes re:walk Telok Ayer (2022) and Guide Us (2022).
Movement Collaborator & Performer / Jo KWEK
Jo Kwek graduated with a Diploma in Performing Arts (Drama) from LaSalle (SIA) College of the Arts. Since then, she has been involved in numerous theatre productions and television dramas both in Singapore and abroad. She is also an arts educator in Singapore and China.
Movement Collaborator & Performer / Kimberly LONG
Kimberly graduated from SOTA with an International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma in 2016. In 2019, Kimberly completed her BA(Hons) Dance degree at LASALLE College of the Arts.
Her passion to nurture the youth led her to start her journey as an instructor with Jete Dance Studio. She also became a dance artist with The Human Expression Second Company to continuously develop herself as an artist. Kimberly has a strong desire to develop her dance pedagogy and style that focuses on fluidity in movements. She is open to working with various artists in the hopes of layering her voice as an artist. She hopes to continuously carve her path as a dance artist.
Movement Collaborator & Performer / NG Mun Poh
Mun Poh is a theatre practitioner, performer and educator. She has been in many productions such as The Bride Always Knocks Twice — Killer Secrets, Four Horse Road, Immortalx, The wee Question Mark series, and Day I Met the Prince among others. As a playwright and performer, she has created a few monodramas: Almost Home, Daughter, I believe. She trained with The Theatre Practice’s Actor’s Lab. Her performance credits with Lab include The Nude, Upstream and Uproot. Mun Poh is also committed to teaching and promoting children’s drama education. Be it rehearsing, performing, creating and teaching, she continues to explore her relationship with self and others through her work.
Movement Collaborator & Performer / Wendy TOH
Wendy Toh is a multi-disciplinary Singaporean artist whose work ranges from the performance arts to making experimental films. She is a member of Jinen Butoh School (Italy) and an alumni of Singapore’s Intercultural Theatre Institute.
Music & Sound Designer / Ferry
Ferry is an installation artist, musician, educator, and collaborator. Honed through a practice that spans design, music, art, education and theatre, Ferry’s edge is in the ability to synthesise ideas and practices from diverse fields, utilising different methodologies to create audience experiences that engage through multiple means.
Her works range from large-scale installations such as Sky Kave – first commissioned by Singapore International Festival of Arts (May 2018), recommissioned for Reflections Festival (Oct 2018) and Light to Night Festival (Jan 2019) – to collaborative performances with various art makers such as Songs of Tau for Project Utopia – The Theatre Practice (Aug 2019).
Music & Sound Designer / Vick LOW
Vick is a sound designer/artist based in Singapore. Being traditionally trained in the cello, he fuses both organic and electronic sonic elements to create textural soundscapes. His works are influenced by the genres of Minimalism, Electronica and Ambient, creating a space for organic and electronic elements to co-exist.
After graduating from Lasalle College of the Arts in 2015, specialising in Music Technology, he went on to design for dance, film and theatre. In 2019, he was nominated for Best Sound Design for The Straits Times Life Theatre Awards for The Watching (Toy Factory Productions). Being heavily involved in Theatre for Young Audiences, his compositions have been featured in works such as In Search of You (The Kueh Tutus), When Sadness Comes to Call (MySuperFuture Theatrical Productions), Esplanade Playtime Series The Dragon’s Dentist and Us. Some of his recent sound design work include Kwa Geok Choo (Toy Factory Productions), See You Anniversary (Nine Years Theatre), Hutan (2022 AWESOME Festival, Perth) and Windward Side of the Mountain (SCCC Cultural Extravaganza 2022)
Production Team
Commissioned by Esplanade
Director: Eva Tang
Choreographers & Dance Artists: Chiew Peishan & Lim Chin Huat
Movement Collaborators & Performers: Jo Kwek, Kimberly Long, Ng Mun Poh & Wendy Toh
Music & Sound Designers: Ferry & Vick Low
Cast: Ganapathy Balamurugan, Md Mukul, Rafique, Tahar Sarkar
Editor: Alson Ho
Production Design & Wardrobe: Dorothy Png & Ang Hui Bin
Director of Photography: Shyan Tan
Gaffer: Eljin Tan
Colourist: Eugene Seah
Production Manager: Shirley Chia
Assistant Director: Gayle Hariff
Hair & Make-up: Hana Leong
Visual Effects: Kew Lin
1st Camera Assistant: Justin Faith Ng
2nd Camera Assistant: Chow Hui Xian
Grip: Spencer Jerrold Maximilian
Junior Grip: McDouglas Lim & Vivienne Chong
Location Sound Recordist: Chris Ang
Art Assistants: Ian Lee & Lee Jia Jing
Art Assistant Interns: Li Jiaxuan & Wu Zixin
Production Assistants: Ang Peishan and Gu Yixin