Last weekend (30-31 May 2009) was the International Museum Day 2009. To those who don't quite get what I mean, International Museum Day means FREE ENTRY !!! :D I went to Singapore Art Museum (SAM) and Asian Civilization Museum (ACM), as those are the two museums that I'd like to visit the most. Which I haven't done until there's this FREE ENTRY opportunity :D
At ACM, you'll see the old art. The old wisdom and culture. Their beliefs, how they live, and what are their life's values. At ACM, the feelings that are evoked are respect, awe, sentimental and sometimes creepy.
Seeing all those artifacts on display, I feel like I can actually feel the energy. You see, most of the stuff on display is hundreds of years old. And it has been absorbing and transmitting people's hopes, wishes, secrets, fears and prayers for the longest time. So it may be just a piece of wood/rock at the beginning, but when the wood receives such concentrated energy from humans for a long period of time, it will retain the energy, and soon will considered "sacred".
So last week, I purposely come to see the Fantastic Creatures Exhibition (specially curated for children), at Asian Civilisations Museum, from 25 Jan 2009 - 12 Jul 2009. The collections are not so much, but nevertheless, fantastic. :)
It displays a fascinating arrays of truly fantastic creatures from all over Asia, and one of my favorite is the Quilin (above) (a magical creature with body of a deer, the head of a lion, green scales with fire along its back and a long froth-covered horn; and was told that it sounded like bells and musical instruments)
My other personal favorite is Makara (above). A mythical creature with the head of an elephant and body of a crocodile. I found this piece particular very captivating. I can't explain why. Simply stunning!
Looking at these fantastic creatures, I was thinking, how can our ancestors design such a creature? What were they thinking .. ? But whatever it is, surely they have awesome imagination. :)
If only there's some kind of psychology of archaeology studies on these anonymous old masters, it must be very interesting.
And the ACM collection itself, are so amazing, I couldn't even put it words. The best thing to do is to come and wee the exhibition by yourself. By the way, I'm not paid to say this, but it's just how I feel.
Meanwhile, over at theSingapore Art Museum (SAM), you'll see the "new" art. As a result of this quick paced-interconnecting-ever changing world that we're living in now. A different era will resulted in a different kind of art. So this modern art, those that are exhibited at SAM, are ours. It belongs to our generation, it's a reminder of how we live, what are our life's values, what are the gods that we worshiped, what are the things that we despise. Well, it's totally reflecting the new age we're living in, I guess.
It's supposed to be a very interesting place to visit. And I still have the time to pose :D (above) But there are few exhibition that got me really annoyed, because it's highly disturbing. :-S
So all in all, I like ACM better :D. Maybe it's also because I'm not a risk-taker by nature. And I feel comfortable in the more established grounds. Like the centuries old of wisdom. :D
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