When someone mentions traditional dance, what comes to your mind? Stodgy routines from a bygone era? If that is your impression of the art form, then a visit to the exhibition ROUTES: A Multi-Perspective Exploration of Traditional Dance In Singapore at Stamford Arts Centre will help to change your mind.
ROUTES, a play on the word “roots”, is an engaging exhibition that makes use of storytelling and immersive technology to present the perspectives of Singapore practitioners of traditional dance forms and the evolution of traditional dance.
An Immersive Look at Traditional Dance in Singapore
The 20-minute presentation provides a multi-perspective look into local Chinese, Malay and Indian traditional dance forms and how local artists and arts bodies are taking them forward.
Featured in it are Singapore’s dance pioneers and practitioners including Santha
Bhaskar, Som Said, Lim Moi Kim, Cai Shiji, Raka Maitra and Noramin Farid. Interviews with these practitioners are interweaved with short performances to tell the story of traditional dance in Singapore.
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The exhibition makes use life-sized holographic mesh projections. The audience is seated around the mesh on individual (socially-distanced of course) seats This makes it seem as if the artists being interviewed and performers are present the midst of the audience.
Dance: More Than Movement
What we enjoyed about the show is the chance to gain insights into the thinking of the arts practitioners. For example, what they think of as the crux of traditional dance forms and how they view it as an embodiment of cultural values and as an evolving art form that grows with the times, not simply a static repetition of the past.
The ROUTES opens up a window for those seeking to gain a better understanding of traditional dance in Singapore. We feel that it would speak best to adults and older kids who have an interest in dance.
ROUTES: A Multi-Perspective Exploration Of Traditional Dance In Singapore At Stamford Arts Centre
ROUTES: A Multi-Perspective Exploration of Traditional Dance in Singapore is now on at Stamford Arts Centre, behind Bugis+, till 12 September 2021. It is open daily from 9 am to 10 pm with the last screening at 9.30 pm. Admission is free.
