eMagazine SentAp! ISE

SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE



SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE Editor-in-Chief Published by Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin TERATAK NUROMAR 27, Laluan Tasek Timur 12 Guest Editor Taman Seri Dermawan Anca Rujoiu 31400 Ipoh, Perak Malaysia Text Contributors E-mail: [email protected] Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin Anca Rujoiu Publication supported by Ute Meta Bauer NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore Tan Zi Hao Blk 6 Lock Rd, #01-09/10, Gillman Barracks M. Hijaz Mohammad Singapore 108934 Syed Omar Husain E-mail: [email protected] ntu.ccasingapore.org Proofreader Aminah Ibrahim A+ WORKS OF ART d6-G-8 d6 Trade Centre, Jalan Sentul Design 53300 Kuala Lumpur Yan Malaysia E-mail: [email protected] Associate http://www.aplusart.asia Ise parkingproject Foundation This special issue of sentAp! is published on the occasion Printing of Roslisham Ismail aka Ise solo project Campur, Tolak, Unico Services Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan (Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, Equals) at A+ WORKS of ART (17 December 2020 - 9 January Publication date 2021) and NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore (16 January 2021 January - 28 February 2021) ISBN 978-983-43887-6-8 Copyright © 2021 Teratak Nuromar, 2021 NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore 2021 A+ Works of Art, All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, except for purposes of research or private study, criticism and review, without prior written permission from the publisher.

Contents 3 Editor’s Note Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin 5 Welcome Note Ute Meta Bauer 7 Comic Drawings Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid 13 Campur, Tolak, Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan (Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, Equals) Anca Rujoiu 21 Intimate Afterlives: In Dialogue with Ark Fongsmut Tan Zi Hao 30 Let’s Detox: In Dialogue with Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin Tan Zi Hao 39 That Indescribable Magic: In Dialogue with Russell Storer Tan Zi Hao 49 Each Time We Met, We Celebrated the Harvest: In Dialogue with ruangrupa Anca Rujoiu 65 The Mind Diary M. Hijaz Mohammad and Syed Omar Husain 68 Operation Bangkok Roslisham Ismail aka Ise

Editor’s Note When A+ Works of Art first contacted me requesting my enough. He trotted the globe almost non-stop for nearly consent to publish this special edition of sentAp! with two decades to participate in numerous art projects, support from the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art biennales, and residency programmes in various art Singapore, I instantly agreed without giving it a second hubs, institutions and cities, and to visit and establish thought. connection with artists and curators all over the world. Ade Darmawan, the co-founder of ruangrupa, states After more than a year of his passing, I find it very in his conversation with Anca Rujoiu, featured in this appropriate, and to a certain extent highly symbolic, to publication: “The young artists have that awareness have stories and vignettes about Roslisham Ismail aka that being an artist is also being in conversation with Ise in a publication that he co-founded and was very other contexts. Even in my generation, if you go to dear to his heart. In 2005, the late Ise and I, seeing Jogja, artists are stuck in their studios. They didn’t go the lack of a platform in Malaysia dedicated to writing anywhere. So in that context, Ise broke that tradition.” about contemporary art, conceived the idea of an art magazine. We presented our concept to the National Art Over the years, Ise’s relationship with friends and Gallery (NAG) in Kuala Lumpur and managed to secure collaborators from different backgrounds and some seed money from the institution to execute our disciplines, within and beyond Malaysia, had become first ever collaborative project. Once we announced one of the important elements that helped develop our intention to publish sentAp! Contemporary Art his artistic career. These “superfriends”, as he called Magazine, many in the arts community, including them, not only consist of artists, curators, critics, fellow artists, critics, writers, scholars, collectors, collectors and people in the art circuit, but also gallery owners, and founders of alternative art spaces, philanthropists, chefs, factory workers, craftsmen, rallied their support behind us. The mock-up of the first researchers, elderly women in his kampong—all kinds edition of sentAp! was unveiled to friends, sponsors, of ordinary people whom he had befriended along and supporters during a special session at the NAG’s his life’s journeys and while making his art projects, café. A few months later, the magazine was officially and who, directly or indirectly, had contributed some launched by the renowned filmmaker U-Wei Hj Saari at ideas and inspirations to Ise’s artistic practice. the Galeri MAYA in Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur with the help of our close friend Rafizah Abdul Rahman, the gallery’s In this publication, memories, stories and reflections manager. The rest, as the cliché goes, is history. concerning Ise’s life and journey in art since his student days at the Universiti Teknologi MARA are collected Ise made his first mark in the contemporary art scene, and narrated through several interviews conducted particularly within this region and internationally, when by Tan Zi Hao and Anca Rujoiu with some of Ise’s he took a bold step very early in his career to leave his friends. These will give us some fascinating insights into comfort zone as an artist working in Malaysia whose Ise’s deep and lifelong obsession with his art, and his art scene he found not challenging and stimulating passion for exploring new places, enlarging his network sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 3

of friends and acquaintances, establishing ties with the sweet and fun moments he had spent together with potential collaborators and so on. We hope that the his friends of parkingproject. Last but not least, thank readers, or at least those who had crossed paths with you very much to Yan for the service he has rendered Ise, will be inspired and motivated by his experiences, as the permanent designer of sentAp! and for sticking especially with regard to how he had developed his with us throughout these years, especially during the artistic practice and career to become among a very magazine’s early days in the mid-2000s that saw us small number of Malaysian artists who have attained a doing “guerilla” publishing and distribution work due to relatively high degree of visibility and fame in regional our super limited budget and means. and international contemporary art arenas. Ise, rest in peace dearest brother. I am very grateful for the efforts made by Anca Rujoiu, my co-editor for this publication, in formulating the Al-Fatihah. themes and ideas behind this special issue and in getting several figures from the art world to share their personal Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin experiences and stories regarding their friendship and dealing with Ise. My appreciation also goes to Joshua Lim of A+ Works of Art for providing assistance and support for the production of this publication. I would like to humbly extend my special gratitude to Ise’s sister Roslawati Ismail [Kak Tie], as a representative of the Ise parkingproject Foundation, for her patience and belief in the process of presenting Ise’s works in the gallery and in this publication. Finally, after nearly a decade since his first solo show in Malaysia, we now have the opportunity to view some of Ise’s old and unseen works and his latest project, that to some extent nicely encapsulate, among other things, his seriousness and commitment to his art. Kudos to his parkingproject hardcore friends (you Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin, Campaign Series know who you are!), all of you have been really great “Support parkingproject”, ink and acrylic on metal base, in providing moral, emotional, and all kinds of other support to Ise when he was alive! Throughout my 15 cm diameter, 2007 relationship with him, Ise always spoke joyfully about 4 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Welcome Note Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, took part in the first years of and of Singapore in general. Sira Pisang (2015) was also NTU CCA Singapore’s Artist-in-Residence programme the inaugural commission for the Roof Garden Gallery (6 April to 16 June 2015), and was the first Malaysian of the then newly opened National Gallery Singapore. artist joining the Centre at Gillman Barracks. As he was using his studio intensely, we benefited from his Delving into the layered histories of Southeast Asia generosity and way of sharing, from his humour and through conversations with participants of his cooking collective spirit, and we also learned about Kelantan, events, Ise recorded these oral histories in the form the Malaysian region close to the Thai border, where of drawings. “To be in residence” was for Ise a tool to he grew up with his beloved grandmother’s sister. At engage in social encounters for his artistic production. that time, he was recovering from a past surgery, yet he His approach in his practice as an artist has always been worked in the studio every day and channelled his fear participatory, embedded in conversation, friendship and of fighting the unknown (of his illness) into a series of the experiences of simply living life among a multitude colourful drawings that filled the walls of his studio space, of communities internationally. depicting the fight between good and black demonic forces. The drawings were unfortunately damaged by Ise’s residency coincided with other Malaysian termites at Ise’s house in his hometown in Kelantan. practitioners, artist I-Lann, who joined the Centre soon Sadly, we were unable to show this unique series of after his arrival, and curator Simon Soon. Both I-Lann drawings as initially planned in our 2017 exhibition, The and Ise employed a material-based approach in their Making of an Institution, that brought together projects practice, through the use of photography, drawing and research explorations by artists and curators from and printing— applying these as research methods to our Residencies programme in tracing the overarching embody oral history and storytelling in their gathering curatorial narrative Place.Labour.Capital. of material, regional skill and craft as a tribute to the regions they grew up in. Hence in a public open studio During Ise’s residency, he also explored the relationship conversation (13 June 2015) moderated by Vera Mey, between Malaysian and Singaporean communities the Centre’s Curator for Residencies at the time, Ise through a series of cooking events, utilising food as and I-Lann shared their artistic processes, struggles, a social connector. This followed his Langkasuka and talked about what they developed during their Cookbook (2013), a project and compilation of recipes residencies at the Centre. commissioned by and presented in Brisbane at the 7th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT7). One Given Ise’s connection to Singapore and our Centre, of these recipes, “Sira Pisang” (Sweet Glazed Banana), and learning about his planned exhibition in Kuala Ise’s step-by-step illustration from the book, was Lumpur (his first in a decade), it was an obvious move reproduced in our Centre’s publication Place. Labour. to propose that the show travels to Singapore. It is Capital. (2018), following Ise’s suggestion. It was a recipe unfortunate that with Ise’s untimely passing in July that reminded Ise of his residency at Gillman Barracks, 2019 that he could not see this project through to the sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 5

Ise in his Artist-in-Residence studio at NTU CCA Singapore, 2015. Photograph by Koh Nguang How. end. We are honoured to present Campur, Tolak, Kali, My sincere gratitude goes to Anca Rujoiu, to Ise’s Bahagi, Sama Dengan (Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, family, to Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin (co-founder Equals), curated by Anca Rujoiu, our former Curator of of sentAp!), and to Joshua Lim and A+ Works of Art Exhibitions and Head of Publications, at our Centre (16 for making this exhibition in Singapore possible. This January to 28 February 2021) as part of Singapore Art exhibition is dedicated to our dear friend Ise, pointing Week, making it the last exhibition in The Lab before to his outstanding practice as an artist, and reminding the closing of our exhibition space at Gillman Barracks. us of the big loss, artistically and personally. Ute Meta Bauer (Germany/Singapore) is a curator and since 2013, has been the Founding Director of NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore (NTU CCA Singapore) and a Professor at the School of Art, Design and Media, NTU. Prior, she was Associate Professor, School of Architecture and Planning, MIT, Cambridge, and Founding Director of the MIT Programme in Art, Culture and Technology (ACT). She was a co-curator of Documenta11 on the team of Okwui Enwezor (2001/2002) and the artistic director of the 3rd berlin biennale for contemporary art (2004). Her curatorial practice engages with transdisciplinary forms of knowledge production and in the past years, the implications of cultural loss on the climate became a main focus. 6 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Comic Drawings Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 7

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid, Salah sangka di lapangan terbang Christchurch/ Misunderstanding at Christchurch airport, 2018–2020 8 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid, Lelaki Sepuluh Juta Sen/ Ten-million Cents Man, 2018-2020 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 9

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid, Penjahat Yunani di Barcelona/ Greek Bandit in Barcelona, 2018–2020 10 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid, NYC 14th Street, 2018–2020 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 11

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid, Gelora Bung Karno (Stadium), 2018–2020 12 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Campur, Tolak, Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan (Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, Equals) Anca Rujoiu I want this show to boom. While Ise’s practice expanded abroad through involvement in large-scale perennial exhibitions and Ise emphasised to me on Messenger in 2018 when multiple residency programmes, he was yearning to our discussions about his much-contemplated solo present his work in Kuala Lumpur within the format exhibition in Kuala Lumpur were unfolding.1 Planned of a solo project. Unlike group exhibitions, a solo to open in 2019, yet impacted by the artist’s saddening by nature foregrounds an artist’s voice, creates the departure, this exhibition would have marked a decade foundation for critical appraisal, and entails a more since Ghost, Ise’s last solo at home.2 In the strict sense in-depth engagement with one’s practice. As much as of the word, the two-day project in 2010 was hardly this project was planned to take place in a gallery, on “solo”; it was thoroughly collaborative, the outcome of a small scale, it aspired to generate a more nuanced merged voices and exchanges, between people from understanding of Ise’s practice and, foremost, to all walks of life, between art and music, as fellows of bring his experiences home. contemporary culture. Eschewing to display images in the exhibition, Ise engaged a group of sixty people I looked back at my notes, and to respond to his ten new drawings in private sessions I found out that while I was in recorded and edited into soundscapes. Visitors were Germany for a short trip in 2016, encouraged to experience the images through the I wrote the title for my unknown soundtrack, while other musicians performed in the solo project or show: Campur, space. Then and across his practice, Ise remained tolak, kali, bahagi, sama dengan. preoccupied with art’s agency not to merely represent or mirror the world, but to participate in it. 1 All the statements interspersed in this essay belong to Roslisham Ismail aka Ise and are extracted from our informal conversation on Messenger that took place between 2018 and 2019 in preparation for this exhibition. I have edited lightly the original statements by Ise for readability. While our discussion was private, I found it appropriate to quote Ise in this essay as a way to foreground his voice in the context of an exhibition he envisioned and which could only be held posthumously. 2 The solo project was curated by Eva McGovern and Vincent Leong. Eva McGovern, “Ghost Stories,” Arteri (May 5, 2010), retrieved from: http:// arteri.search-art.asia/2010/05/05/spectral-nights; Vincent Leong, “GHOST: by Roslisham Ismail @ Ise,” Something in Nothing: The Works of Vincent Leong (June 14, 2011), retrieved from: http://somethinginnothing.blogspot.com/2011/06/ghost-by-roslisham-ismail-ise.html. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 13

Already jotted down in 2016, Ise’s title was not attuned underlined that his process and tools might be different to any specific work, but applied largely to all. In or unconventional, he might break traditions at home, our conversation, Ise explained that he saw in basic yet what he makes is no less endowed with artistic arithmetic operations and their specific properties, a qualities.3 In his witty and provocative manner, Ise reflection on his artistic process. Actions are performed wanted the title to remain obscure, intriguing, and open differently, yet the results could be the same. Whichever to interpretation. By employing only the mathematical pathway one takes, one might eventually reach the symbols for the exhibition’s visual identity, the related same destination. Responding indirectly to doubts poster or invitation aimed to make people think, fill in and misunderstandings surrounding his work, Ise the gaps or simply embrace the unknown. Roslisham Ismail aka Ise and superfriends, initial designs for Campur, Tolak, Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan (Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide, Equals) visual identity, 2018. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. 3 The reflection on art-making process encompassed by this title resonates with another description of his work provided by Ise in a previous interview. “Painters 100 years ago—” explains Ise with regards to the work Secret Affair“ —also went to the market to buy vegetables and put them in a still life painting. For me it was the same. I went to the market and put the food on display. It’s just another way of working.” Xiaofei Mo, “Roslisham Ismail aka Ise: Nasi Kerabu Workshop,” Asia Art Archive in America (June 8, 2016), retrieved from: https://www.aaa-a.org/programs/roslisham- ismail-a-k-a-ise-cookbook-workshop/. Secret Affair (2011) was Ise’s contribution to the Singapore Biennial and consisted of a collaboration with six local families. Making connections with each family, Ise explored their food purchase patterns and habits for organising the fridge. Six fridges whose content was organised according to each specific family were installed in the museum space. Russell Storer, co-curator of that Biennial edition, unpacks this project in the interview by Tan Zi Hao. 14 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Gradually the title started to gain a more concrete serendipitous encounters and conversations. This connotation with our discussions evolving around body of drawings, never shown to a Kuala Lumpur the direction of the exhibition. The project was never audience, connected seamlessly with Ise’s concept conceived as a survey; a mid-career retrospective is, for a new series of work. Ise’s envisaged series of I believe, a museum or a large-scale institution due. comic illustrations narrating his journeys in different Yet this solo did carry a more ambitious scope–an parts of the world worked out as a matching piece ambition that was not defined by scale, as in the in a puzzle. Although produced four years apart, number of shown works, but one that embodied a the two series come together highlighting the reflexive scope. I saw at the time, the potential of cosmopolitan spirit of Ise’s work, the encounters Operation Bangkok, a ramification of Ise’s residency with people, friends and strangers alike, that had project at Bangkok University Gallery in 2014, to shaped his work and life. In an interplay between capture Ise’s process of art-making greatly, precisely background and foreground, between the drawings his ways of conducting research and producing and the light boxes, different layers of time overlap knowledge through the mediation of planned or giving the exhibition the quality of a palimpsest. Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, study drawing for solo show at A+ Works of Art, 2018. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. So it’s like a mission. Getting information from random people is more interesting because some places even my Bangkok friends don’t know about. Like a super old school café in another hospital, only Thai people go there. I think I love working this way cause I like to make friends. I like to transfer what I love in my real life into my art. Sometimes I am confused. Am I working or playing? sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 15

This account exceeds the specific reference to later in his infamous submission for the 2004 Young Operation Bangkok—Ise was always on a mission. In Contemporaries Award at the National Art Gallery in a mural installation—one component of his Keluar Kuala Lumpur.4 90 Hari alongside collages and an artist’s book—Ise covered the walls with paper cut-outs missiles in the As someone who saw his art-making as a mission, presentation at 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian there is no surprise that Ise immediately connected Art in Sydney (2006) and stencilled rockets at Kedai to the title of the 1967 Thai-Hong Kong film Kebun Forum in Yogyakarta (2007), respectively. In production, Operation Bangkok, whose poster he such devices, he saw a metaphor for applications or encountered while meandering in a flea market proposals propelled into the world; one could never during his residency in Bangkok. A mapping project certainly anticipate the outcome or the exact target. shaped from the ground, Operation Bangkok (2014) Drawing an equivalent between “artistic work” and brings us to places and events meaningful to those for “mission”, Ise expressed his conviction in art as whom Bangkok is home. We discover, through Ise’s a purposeful, processual, and outward-oriented eyes, walks and interactions with students, friends and activity. His intention to reach out, intervene in strangers, Bangkok as a living city rather than solely the world, was manifested much earlier in his a tourist destination on the global market. From the graduation work, which was in all aspects, a step New World Mall, an abandoned shopping mall that outside the school. Pointing out the substance-use became a flourishing fish pond; the Thieves’ Market, challenges faced by students, in Outdoor Classroom a nighttime endeavour that required visitors and (1995) Ise used the University’s parking space for shoppers to use torchlight to browse through the visitors as his work location. Bringing out benches second-hand products; the popcorn bag that became and aligning them in several rows, he recreated a a symbol of the 2014 anti-government protests; to the typical classroom. While employing existing objects tarot reading on the “fortune teller’s avenue” next to as artistic material, Ise reversed the tradition of Thammasat University; we experience an alternative ready-made and brought the everyday outside the cartography of Bangkok. In a short time span, this (art) institution. His preoccupation was in equal mapping project gained archival significance, as measure to legitimise the mundane as a medium for several of the captured locations are gone or have production and the outdoors as an integral aspect seen transformations. Following a public appeal, Si of his work. As a student of sculpture at the time, Quey Sae-Ung, allegedly a bogeyman of the anti- Ise was expected to produce a three-dimensional communist attitudes in the post-war era in Thailand, work using physical materials. To allude irreverently was given a cremation ceremony after more than sixty to this expectation, Ise tied to or placed on each years of his bullet-ridden and embalmed body being bench an odd wire that looked out of place. With on display at the Siriraj Medical Museum in Bangkok. wit, Ise was doing his own thing, while bending The thousands of fish that took over the derelict fixed rules and negotiating with expectations and shopping mall were removed. The Khlong Thom traditions. This manoeuvre would excel a few years market, opened every Saturday night and known 4 As a response to the strict rule that artworks submitted for the award should not be larger than 3m x 3m x 3m, Ise proposed a project whose total volume was 27m3 cube filled with cardboxes, newspapers and paper he collected. This iconic work 3m x 3m x 3m = 27m3 is discussed at length by curator Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin in her interview by Tan Zi Hao. The cover of sentAp! first issue (July – October 2005) captures a moment when the 27m3 cube is crashed by Ise and superfriends, creating a mess of waste material in the museum space. 16 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

informally as “Thieves’ Market” or “Flashlight Market” exhibition. Informed by the visual language of horror was shut down by the authorities in 2015 and street films, the posters extended into a film shot by the merchants were asked to relocate.5 artists, which remained to date unedited.7 Ise employed a photocopied map of Bangkok as If a poster compresses the memory of a film and the background of his drawings and marked various becomes a precious souvenir, eventually, Operation locations in his journey with post-its stuck on paper. Bangkok played a similar role. Upon his return to Kuala The use of a dynamic range and combination of Lumpur, Ise produced these large-format drawings colours outlined by black lines intensifies the contrast based on his notes and out of his memory. A collector with the map underneath and heightens the drawings’ of objects, stories and ephemera, Ise often found cartoonish look. The simple and bold text juxtaposed refuge in his memories. In 2005, disappointed with with iconic visuals compresses each experience of a the reception of his work 3m x 3m x 3m = 27m3, Ise site, an event, an activity into a memorable image. The withdrew in the studio and produced a new series of film poster that grabbed Ise’s attention in a flea market drawings, Illustration from Memory (2005) evoking not only informed the project’s title, but in equal his experiences abroad, from a visit to Tate Modern measure determined the format and the aesthetics in London to a teh botol drink in Indonesia, as well of this series of drawings. For an artist invested in as inner struggles and dilemmas. As with other of his outreach, popular culture and urban environment, the projects, Ise’s Operation Bangkok took shape as an act poster carried a great potential, which Ise optimised of resistance against forgetting. each time imaginatively. In 2010, during his residency at Britto – Art Trust in Panam City, impressed by the Since his very first residency in 2003 at Khoj ubiquitous presence of Bangladeshi film posters in the International Artists’ Association, New Delhi, Ise city, Ise produced a series on his own. People who travelled extensively. The act of travelling not Ise befriended during the residency saw themselves only exposed Ise to different contexts and people, on the city walls featured as protagonists alongside but it also gave him the necessary distance from existing actors in films imagined by Ise. With minimum an environment that might have felt sometimes means, Ise generated a moment of wonder and joy suffocating, limiting or too comfortable. Operation among his new acquaintances and embedded his Bangkok conveys Ise’s social vibrancy and interest work into the city.6 In the same year, the film poster into the new making this mapping experiment a became the trigger of the Trio Terror (2010), Ise’s tour de force. The curator Ark Fongsmut might be collaboration with Narpati Awangga [Oomleo] and right when he calls Operation Bangkok the happiest Indra Ameng as part of ruangrupa’s tenth-anniversary project Ise has ever done.8 5 King-Oua Laohong, “Si Quey’s body cremated at last,” Bangkok Post (July 24, 2020), retrieved from https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/ general/1956483/si-queys-body-cremated-at-last. Supoj Wancharoen, “Fish pulled from New World,” Bangkok Post (January 13, 2015), retrieved from https://www.bangkokpost.com/thailand/general/456620/fish-pulled-from-new-world-pond. “Thailand: Khlong thom market next target in city hall’s pavements cleanup campaign,” Asia News Monitor (December 10, 2014), retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/newspapers/ thailand-khlong-thom-market-next-target-city/docview/1634487728/se-2?accountid=12528. I am grateful to curator Ark Fongsmut for providing insights about Operation Bangkok in a conversation on Zoom on May 5, 2020 and in the interview by Tan Zi Hao. 6 Ise provided a description of this project in this interview: Enoch Cheng, “Interview with Roslisham Ismail (a.k.a. Ise),” Asia Art Archive (June 1, 2011), retrieved from: https://aaa.org.hk/en/ideas/ideas/interview-with-roslisham-ismail-a-k-a-ise. 7 Ibid. Trio Terror is recalled by Oomleo in the conversation with the author. 8 Conversation with Ark Fongsmut by the author, May 5, 2020. According to Ark, Ise confirmed that this series consisted of 33 drawings in total. I had seen twenty-four drawings in Ise’s studio during my visit on July 9, 2018. However only 20 drawings were retrieved in the studio for this exhibition. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 17

I have a new idea. I met this guy at the hospital [Ibrahim Hamid]. I like this kind of comics since primary school. So like jackpot, I met him. My basic idea is I want to collaborate with him. I will ask him to make one comic page [from a selection] of experiences then I will scan it and the final artwork will be a before standing lightbox. In 2018, Ise started a project with the comic book Yet in this series, displayed in mobile lightboxes, Ise artist Ibrahim Hamid (Pak Him), a collaboration that employed self-narration strategies situating himself sadly marked Ise’s last body of work. In the vicissitudes inside the story as protagonist. Checked for hours of life, Ise and Pak Him first met at the hospital in at Christchurch’s customs; mugged in Barcelona Kota Bharu, where both were undergoing dialysis at knifepoint; stopped by the police in Jakarta after treatment. Ise commissioned Pak Him to execute, a football match between Malaysia and Indonesia, following his instructions and study drawings, a and so on, Ise revived his micro-narratives through series of black and white, graphic novel illustrations. a fictionalised persona and Pak Him’s craftsmanship. Posthumously, Ise’s sister, Roslawati Ismail (Kak Tie), Portraying himself within a world with many others, continued the communication with Pak Him for this friends and strangers alike, Ise affirmed his continuous series to be completed close to Ise’s vision. Study interest in the virtues and intricacies of the social. drawings were an integral part of Ise’s artistic process; Ultimately, these illustrations communicate the they configured the works and determined their cosmopolitan spirit enwrapping Ise’s practice. I refer execution.9 In retrospect, study drawings serve as a here to an embodiment of cosmopolitanism that is precious archive of Ise’s works shaped by the artist. not rooted in the myth of the European Enlightenment but one that articulates for a subject, an understanding Fictional characters have been recurrent in Ise’s of belonging as processual and the possibility of drawings informed by the visual vernacular of comics. “inhabiting multiple places at once, of being different beings simultaneously.”10 Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Drug Designer at Christchurch Airport and New York, study drawings for portable lightboxes with comic drawings in collaboration with Ibrahim Hamid (Pak Him), 2018. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. 9 This aspect is recalled as well by Reza Afisina [Asung] in the conversation with the author. 10 “Cosmopolitanisms”, Carol A. Breckenride, Sheldon Polllock, Homi K. Bhabha and Dipesh Chakrabarty (eds). in Cosmopolitanism (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002), 11. 18 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

The product of Ise’s selective memory, these anecdotal and flying freely above mountains and across clouds. episodes fatefully became a project of selective The confrontation, between the disembodied, frail remembrance. Positioning himself in the story, Ise hands and the destructive force kept repeating with made a choice of how he wanted to be remembered insignificant variation, but with gripping force in for posterity. Here we have Ise being different beings: every single drawing. My view of Ise’s practice was Ise, the curious but ill-fated tourist, who got robbed shaped by the expansive quality of his art-making on his first day in Barcelona while visiting the Gothic process and the passion he put in his work then Quarter, one of the most popular sightseeing areas and three years later in this exhibition. “Passion” as in this Catalan city; Ise, the “Malaysian boy” who out in a strenuous commitment to art in which Ise saw of luck encounters the police in Jakarta right after a so many possibilities: expression and introspection, disputed football match in which his co-nationals were connectivity and friendship, research and knowledge allegedly cheating; Ise, the “bionic man” undergoing production, and foremost, participation in the world. a fourteen hour surgery in which eight screws were implanted in his spinal cord; Ise, the “drug designer” * who raised the suspicion of Christchurch Immigration office for holding two laptops in his trip, travelling In our early planning of the exhibition, Ise and I extensively between Taipei, Hong Kong, Sydney discussed the production of a pop-up book narrating and Christchurch for exhibitions and presenting at the stories of his iconic robot character. We didn’t customs a passport filled with stamps, three years manage to advance with this idea and left it behind. ahead of its expiry; Ise, the artist-in-residence, with As Ise was passionate about printed matter and artists’ his superfriend Kanako from Japan, strolling together publications, I considered it essential to work with in New York, across Manhattan, Bronx, Queens and Ise’s artistic tools, one being sentAp!, a magazine Brooklyn, and so on. co-founded by Ise and curator Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin in 2005. I am extremely grateful to Hanim If we talk about energy [...], I who accepted the proposal to do this special issue don’t have energy. dedicated to Ise that privileges discussions with several artists and curators close to Ise. I am thankful But it’s all about passion. to Yan for resuming his work as a designer for sentAp! and M.Hijaz Mohammad and Syed Omar Husain, for Ise wrote to me with regards to another event he was agreeing to reprint an essay. Published in sentAp! in working for in parallel with this exhibition. He rarely 2007, this essay revisits Ise’s residency at the Gunnery expressed fatigue and seldom talked openly about Studios in Sydney in 2006 that has been influential his health struggles. He channelled all his concerns to his practice, notably his first solo exhibition that into the work. This tendency framed my first image was hosted by the 4A Centre for Contemporary Art of Ise when we crossed paths in Singapore. Invited within the same year. I am thankful to writer Tan Zi as an Artist-in-Residence at the NTU Centre for Hao and the participants to his interviews, curators Ark Contemporary Art Singapore in 2015, Ise worked Fongsmut, Russell Storer and Hanim. Zi Hao diligently tirelessly and covered his studio from floor to ceiling surveyed several of Ise’s projects and produced a with drawings. Long, black hands in his drawings were rigorous overview of his artistic practice and reception stretching and twisting, trying to grasp, push away or in Malaysia and abroad. Ise’s friends, artists Ade block a demonic character who was wielding swords Darmawan, Narpati Awangga [Oomleo], Reza Afisina [Asung], Julia Sarisetiati and Mirwan Andan have sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 19

generously shared memories and reflections on Ise’s relationship with ruangrupa. I am indebted to A+ Works of Art gallery staff and collaborators, Joshua Lim, Aminah Ibrahim, Kenta Chai, and Lee Weng Choy for supporting this project; and to NTU Centre for Contemporary Art team, Ute Meta Bauer, Karin Oen and Tian Lim for bringing this exhibition in Singapore. I would like to pay my respect to Ise parkingproject Foundation and in particular to Ise’s sister, Kak Tie for her efforts to make this exhibition happen. And foremost, thank you Ise for sharing your work and entrusting us with this mission. Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Campur, Tolak, Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan, installation views at A+ Works of Art, 2020. Courtesy of A+ Works of Art. Anca Rujoiu (b. Bucharest) is a curator and editor living in Singapore. As curator of exhibitions and later head of publications (2013– 18), she was a member of the founding team of the NTU Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore contributing to the institution’s exhibitions, public programmes and publishing projects. In 2019 she was the co-curator of the third edition of the Art Encounters Biennial in Timișoara, approached as a one-year institutional programme. As part of the curatorial initiative, FormContent, she worked on the nomadic project, It’s Moving from I to It (2012-2014), that took the format of a script. Her Ph.D. research at Monash University in Melbourne, First-Person Institutions focuses on institution building, artists’ archives, and transnational imaginaries. Whether working in a contemporary art centre, an independent space, or in the context of a biennial, she has been passionate about decentering the curatorial practice and stretching the possibilities of how cultural production can be made public, experienced, discussed, or written about. 20 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Intimate Afterlives: In Dialogue with Ark Fongsmut Tan Zi Hao “I still send messages to Ise,” curator Ark Fongsmut This is not an overstatement. The entire space was recounts, with some reluctance to divulge any further scattered with tables, cabinets, trolley racks of lab information about his relationship with Ise. Such is the paraphernalia and found objects; illustrations and challenge that has persistently cropped up and plagued posters filled the walls; atop the tables on the right the writing of Ise’s artistic repertoire. How do we was a row of computers with various notes, sketches, articulate the intimacies and account for Ise’s good- maps, photos, files, bags, and memorabilia, giving the humoured tact that infected everyone he touched? impression of an overworked office environment; For an artist whose dynamic presence is inextricable to then, an imposing blackboard, scribbled with smudged the works he produced, his passing adds an uncanny words and drawings, was affixed to the furthest wall barrier to the ethos of his works. of the space. Finally, welding these heterogeneous elements together was a song composed by a security Ise’s projects often suffer from clichéd descriptions, guard whom he met at Chulalongkorn University. some of which have already been committed: “exchange,” “relations,” “connections,” “networks,” Intended to be a wide-ranging presentation of his “negotiation,” “engagement,” and many more. Too fortuitous encounters throughout his one-and-a-half- ambitious and generic, these words do little justice month stay, Operation Bangkok reads like a mind map, to Ise’s layered process of art-making. Ise’s Operation a journal, a science lab, literally, with multiple points Bangkok (2014) as curated by Ark is one of those of entry. The drawings selected to be presented in this projects that refuse to be bogged down by these solo project in Kuala Lumpur are “a post-production descriptions. The exhibition, which opened from 26 of Operation Bangkok,” as Ark acutely notes. Produced April to 24 May 2014, was a result of Ise’s residency after the residency, these drawings spawn further programme at Bangkok University Gallery. The show recollections, further intimate afterlives, reflective had a maximalist outlook comprising, as Ark repeatedly of the artist’s personal experience and connections. describes in the following interview, “everything.” Unsurprisingly, Ise considered Operation Bangkok to sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 21

be, to paraphrase Ark, “the best thing in his life.” The gallery. That’s how we met. I saw his work, the exhibition in Bangkok showcased Ise’s spontaneity at Langkasuka Cookbook (2013), and I found it interesting his most memorable, confident moments. Perhaps because I love eating. We spoke and chatted over the without having to bear the brunt of unbridled criticism subject of eating, we exchanged knowledge about that he was so accustomed to in Malaysia, Operation culinary culture. I was quite amused by his cookbook. Bangkok provided a much-needed latitude for Ise, and There was one particular recipe for cooking duck, it an apposite outlet in a place foreign and familiar, to caught my attention because duck meat is difficult to explore his vision of appropriating the outdoors as his cook, it’s harder than chicken meat! And that’s how very own studio.1 we met and we had a few days to chat. I spoke to him and I got to know him a little bit more. Before Tan Zi Hao (TZH): Operation Bangkok was a product of I left Hong Kong, I asked if he would like to join an Ise’s 45-day artist-in-residence at Bangkok University artist residency programme at Bangkok University and Gallery of which you were the curator. When did you he immediately said yes. But after we parted, we were begin extending the invitation to Ise? When was your not in touch. first encounter with Ise, what was it like, and in what ways were you drawn to his works? I did send him messages a couple of times, but he never really replied to them until one day, all of a sudden, he Ark Fongsmut (AF): Actually I met Ise a few years responded “brother, I’m back.” And that’s the message before the Operation Bangkok exhibition. I met him he always sent to me. Apparently, he took some time at the Osage Gallery, Hong Kong. He participated in to recuperate from an operation on his head. But he the group exhibition Market Forces: The Friction of said the doctor actually found nothing. After that, Ise Opposites (2013) and I was one of the participating decided that he was ready to come to Bangkok and curators, curating Arin Rungjang’s work at the same that’s how it all started. Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Langkasuka Cookbook, 2013, mixed media installation, “Market Forces: The Friction of Opposites,” Osage Gallery (Hong Kong). Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. 1 In an interview with Thitipol Panyalimpanun in Bangkok, Ise explained his reason for closing his own studio: “I simply found a bigger studio. And my new studio was outside.” Thitipol Panyalimpanun, “Meet the Malaysian multimedia artist spearheading Operation Bangkok,” BK Asia City (May 15, 2014), retrieved from: https://bk.asia-city.com/events/news/roslisham-ismail-aka-ise-operation-bangkok. This inclination to step outside is also observable in one of Ise’s earlier works, Outdoor Classrooms (1997), with which he addressed the problem of drug use and addiction among high school students by setting up a classroom in a public parking space. 22 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

TZH: Operation Bangkok largely documents Ise’s various serendipitous encounters from the boxing arena to the Thieves’ Market in Bangkok. To some extent, the exhibition appears like a mind-mapping, journalistic and ethnographic exercise—he playfully engages with the mundane, paying great attention to the everyday objects and phenomena that were deemed ordinary to the locals. As the curator, could you describe to us his method of formulating his ideas and the exhibitionary logic that had come to structure his experience? AF: Initially I was thinking that he was going to show Ise’s depiction of the crocodile after his visit to Wat Chakrawat a mural drawing or painting. But when he came to in Bangkok. Courtesy of Ark Fongsmut. Bangkok, he decided to work on something new. So I thought, why not? I encouraged him to explore As a whole, the exhibition became a site for him to Bangkok and I asked some of my students to assist collect and organise information. It served as his own him to travel around Bangkok; visit tourist attractions personal archive of all the objects he had collected in or demonstration sites, street restaurants or massage Bangkok. He placed everything in the gallery space, he parlours—everything! The significance of the exhibition transformed the space into a lab and then he employed lies in how he gathered information bit by bit during lab assistants to fill up the space during the opening. his six-week residency in Bangkok. He put them together ingeniously. That was the most important ZH: Indeed, I am curious about these lab assistants. thing. It’s not so much about the art object itself, but Ise intended to impart to his audience a “what the the tiny little stuff, which could be considered “art” or hell” experience.3 They put on medical lab coats and “non-art.” gave a façade of professionalism, appearing as if they were actually conducting some scientific experiments. Operation Bangkok was a site of exploration, it How did this performative element contribute to the encouraged the local audience to observe what exhibition? we had neglected to see in Bangkok. In one of his works, Ise drew a crocodile after his visit to the AF: The lab assistants were actually visual art students Buddhist temple, Wat Chakrawat. He went to visit from King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology the crocodile pond and he found out that the water Ladkrabang. They were Ise’s friends and assistants. was rotten and polluted. We never know if there’s Some were my BA and MFA students who were actively any environmental statement or whatsoever in the assisting Ise throughout his stay here. We set up some work, and I am not sure whether the audience will computers, showing a fake display. It was all staged, the understand Ise’s sentiment, but I hope the audience lab assistants were pretending to work on something. will reflect on his drawings. If you examine his Some of them were playing and experimenting with the works closely, deep down, he delivered a number of objects laid out on the tables, some were presumably informative details. mixing chemicals, which were not really chemicals but dry ice and water. 3 Thitipol Panyalimpanun, “Meet the Malaysian multimedia artist spearheading Operation Bangkok,” BK Asia City (May 15, 2014), retrieved from: https://bk.asia-city.com/events/news/roslisham-ismail-aka-ise-operation-bangkok. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 23

Like the lab assistants, the viewers were encouraged bringing different artists and curators together for to explore the exhibition. Operation Bangkok had this informal exchange. In Operation Bangkok, this element participatory element. Ise would like the audience to of play was again spotlighted as objects and visuals come and see, to touch and examine these ostensibly were arbitrarily strung together to create a deliberately non-valuable objects that he had found or made up. disorganised mess of information, which in turn, eased He mixed together some disfigured toys that he had accessibility to his installation. The informal setup bought from a junkyard. The display shelf was borrowed gave the audience leeway to circumvent the structural from the library, because the library had old furniture. constraints of an art institution. Among artists, Ise had Ise was always preoccupied with old objects—all the a rare and incredible talent in conceiving works that books, magazines or whatsoever he could find in them. act effortlessly as a social lubricant. What was the So this was different from my impression of Ise in Hong immediate response towards Operation Bangkok in the Kong, because in the group exhibition at Osage Gallery, Thai art scene? To what extent was his notion of play he simply showed what he was doing; there was a wall unique in the region? painting and a video interview of his grandmother.4 But this time in Bangkok, it was different. He wanted the AF: With regards to the idea of “play,” I think it is more audience to play with the objects. about “playing around,” there is a lot of spontaneity in his works. The art objects that he included in the exhibition ZH: The element of play recurs throughout Ise’s were very accessible. The presentation was not very oeuvre. His parkingproject, to some degree, was an serious. The audience was able to touch everything invitation to play, involving dialogues and guided tours, he put on the wall, on the floor, in the cabinet. Even 4 The woman interviewed in the video—whom Ise usually identified as his “grandmother”—is the sister of Ise’s grandmother. See Xiaofei Mo, “Roslisham Ismail a.k.a. Ise: Nasi Kerabu Workshop,” Asian Art Archive (June 8, 2016), retrieved from: https://www.aaa-a.org/programs/roslisham- ismail-a-k-a-ise-cookbook-workshop/. 24 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Operation Bangkok, 2014, mixed media installation. Courtesy of Bangkok University Gallery. the computers, you can turn them on and off, there than anything, Ise was very happy about the show. He was nothing anyway! He wanted people to come and said this was the best thing in his life, at that particular explore, to see the way he saw things. moment, of course, maybe after that, there were other things. Operation Bangkok was unique for this reason. In Thailand, not many artists took the notion of “play” ZH: How would you situate Ise’s oeuvre in the region, meaningfully. People tend to be very serious and and in what ways were they significant historically in conforming. But Ise made things very relaxed by the broader field of contemporary art? showing the process of his works and the experience of his residency, rather than presenting a final art object. AF: Ise’s works focus on the process. Process-oriented Ise’s processual approach was also quite radical. For works were once popular in Thailand especially in example, when the Philippine painter Louie Cordero the 1970s, but not many artists today extend or give was invited to the residency programme in 2015, he new form to this legacy. Sometimes we forget that filled the walls with murals, similar to Ise’s Operation the process is fundamental to the development of Bangkok. But a painter’s working process was confined contemporary art. Ise showed us the process of his to an end result because you are still expecting to see works, which, to me, it felt like “long time no see”! And an artwork. Whereas for Ise, you were able to follow the again, Ise did this not because of history. History is one process of his stay. I think it’s more about giving viewers thing. Ise applied his process-oriented framework to another mode of experiencing the art exhibition. contemporary issues and his everyday life; it was an integral part of his method of investigation. The response towards the exhibition was encouraging, it was reported by Kaona Pongpipat and Thitipol ZH: The title Operation Bangkok definitely deserves Panyalimpanun, who were major writers of the press. some additional comments, could you shed more light Throughout my stint at the Bangkok University Gallery, on the choice of the title? Considering Ise’s health it was quite rare to get any media response. And they predicament at the time and the experimental nature said Ise’s exhibition was the one that managed to garner of the exhibition, the term “operation” could take on media attention, so this was a positive indication. A two intimations: the surgical and the investigative. One few professors and artists even approached me and could even say that it is theatrical, since the title was commended that this was one of the best shows. More appropriated from a film of the same name. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 25

AF: “Operation Bangkok” was actually an action movie him a Muslim doctor, a herbal doctor, I would try to produced in the late 60s. He found the poster as he was find anything for him. After Operation Bangkok, he exploring Bangkok. He became very fond of the name later made another trip to Bangkok and I looked at because he had just undergone an operation. Perhaps his face and his swollen feet, they were very big and he was touched by the name and I think it’s very intimate dark, and I said “hey Ise, this is terrible, your diabetes is to him. After what had happened to him, he came to worse!” When he returned to Malaysia, the condition Bangkok immediately and the term “operation” echoed of his kidneys worsened. He had to undergo dialysis to with him very starkly, so I suggested, why not just use treat his kidneys. And I asked him, “how many times do “Operation Bangkok” as the title of the exhibition. you need to do it?” He said “three times a week.” I was shocked. Three times a week was very severe already! ZH: Did Ise ever speak to you in detail about his But he laughed it off, as usual. My wife and I were operation, since this experience was singularly getting mad at him about his attitude towards health. formative to the exhibition? You mentioned earlier that He always laughed whenever we talked about this. This the doctor operated on his head and found nothing to is a bad point actually. his detriment? This was quite disconcerting to hear. ZH: To return to Operation Bangkok, could you tell us AF: Ise spoke to me numerously about what had more about the many drawings he had produced for happened to him. The first time he disappeared, he told the show, some of which you keep, some of which are me that he had lost consciousness and was in a state included in his posthumous exhibition Campur, Tolak, of coma. The doctor operated on his head and tried to Kali, Bahagi, Sama Dengan (2020–2021). find something wrong, but they couldn’t find anything conclusive. After his coma, he just woke up and he felt AF: The ones I keep are small drawings. He gave them normal. Health-related issues were always there in our out to everyone. All assistants have one or two or discussion, all the time, because I was very concerned three of his drawings. In one of them, he drew a map about his health. And I cannot accept “nothing” or “no documenting his journey in Bangkok, where he took a reason” as an answer. I have to find a reason. As a fifty- boat from the Bangkok University to Lumpini Park, he year-old man, I need to know the reason, I need to also drew the dishes he had experienced, such as beef live longer. So my wife and I always asked him, “why noodles and fried fish. He recorded everything and he don’t you come to Bangkok and check?” We can find liked to put them up on the wall. Ise is known for his habit of documenting his journey. This drawing illustrates his boat ride on Khlong Saen Saep as he moved towards Lumpini Park. Courtesy of Ark Fongsmut. 26 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

There were also thirty-three pieces of big A0 at Bangkok’s Lumpini Park in 2014.5 Throughout the drawings, which he made after he went back to 2010s, Malaysia too was filled with successive waves Malaysia. He showed them to me when I was in of anti-establishment sentiments, the most significant Malaysia. There were drawings of the boxing arena, of which was the Bersih social movement.6 What was New World Mall, Congdon Anatomical Museum, and Ise’s general response since he spent some time with so on, which were his memories of Bangkok. We were the demonstrators at Lumpini Park? Given Malaysia’s planning to have an exhibition, because the series equally fraught socio-political climate, was there an was like a post-production of Operation Bangkok. But affinity that might have resonated with Ise and was unfortunately, he passed away before the plan came expressly articulated in his Operation Bangkok? to fruition. We were also considering if the series could be shown in its own place, as a documentary AF: Ise seemed to refrain from giving direct political of what had happened in Bangkok. Because many statements. Maybe he had some comments but we places Ise had documented have now disappeared. never had conversations about it. He might have spoken The boxing arena is gone, the horse race is gone, the to his assistants because he made a small gang with King abandoned New World Mall containing a fish pond Mongkut University’s students, some of whom have is gone. This mall was a paradise for him because he become artists, art practitioners, professors. But at that had to find ways to sneak inside to get to the fish time, they were students and they ganged up together, pond. The fish lived by nature without any cleaning it was called the Ladkrabang gang. From my impression, system, and they lived nicely and beautifully. But now Ise very much enjoyed attending these demonstrations, it’s gone. A number of things that Ise had recorded in because he had experienced a myriad of things over Bangkok are no longer with us today. there, like how the demonstrators camped and worked together, they built an open-air kitchen, they cooked ZH: It is fascinating that conversations about Ise’s food for themselves, mostly southern cuisine which works precipitate memories of the places he had was very close to Ise’s hometown. He was following a visited, and as we mourn and commemorate his lot of activities there. Have you heard of the “popcorn passing, we are actively revisiting his memories— gunman”?7 They were the people who hid their through his drawings, through your recollection—all pistols behind popcorn bags in order to protect the the while these locations are at risk of erasure. The demonstrators. The protest was frequently interrupted shifting vicissitudes of city life seem to have rendered by mafias sent by the government. So demonstrators Ise’s incidental encounters all the more intimate. But set up their own people as guards. They were given another sign of shifting was forthcoming. Ise came the nickname “popcorn” because they always carried across the anti-government protest then occuring popcorn bags. 5 The protest was prompted by financial irregularity involving the rice-pledging scheme during the administration of Yingluck Shinawatra from 2011 to 2014. Introduced in 2011 and driven by populism, the scheme was a subsidy programme to purchase paddy from farmers at unrealistically high price level while attempting to manipulate the rice export market. The policy failed miserably due to corruption and policy contradiction, leading to protest. For a contextual outlook on rice politics and rice market intervention in Thailand, see Jacob Ricks, “Politics and the Price of Rice in Thailand: Public Choice, Institutional Change and Rural Subsidies,” Journal of Contemporary Asia 48, no. 3 (2018): 395–418. 6 Bersih, or The Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections, was founded by a group of non-governmental organisations to push for electoral reform in Malaysia. Since 2007, the coalition has organised five protest rallies. It rose to prominence during a period of widespread political dissatisfaction— and together with Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf)—normalised the culture of resistance in Malaysia, indirectly contributing to the historic general election in 2008 that denied the ruling party Barisan Nasional its two-third majority. For a useful anthology that captures the zeitgeist of the time, see Nathaniel Tan and John Lee (eds.), Political Tsunami: An End to Hegemony in Malaysia? (Kuala Lumpur: Kinibooks, 2008). 7 For a first-hand account on the shooting and a critical discussion, see Nick Nostitz, “The Laksi Gunfight,” New Mandala (Feb 7, 2014), retrieved from: https://www.newmandala.org/the-laksi-gunfight/ and “The Myth of the Popcorn Gunman,” New Mandala (March 4, 2016), retrieved from: https://www.newmandala.org/the-myth-of-the-popcorn-gunman/. Do not ignore an equally enriching discussion taking place in the comment section of the second article. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 27

Such were the things that caught Ise’s interest. For politics, we hardly talked about it because we both realised that these were complicated issues and we did not really know much about it. Politics is erratic. You would find a demonstration protesting against democracy, because the democratic government at that time was led by Yingluck,8 which had been unscrupulous. So it was very confusing and we never talked about it. It’s very annoying, there are so many layers of complexity that one simply cannot get to the gist of it. It’s like the MH370 incident in Malaysia.9 When Ise came to Bangkok, everyone was asking him about the missing MH370. And as a Malaysian, you know that there is no answer to this. Same in Bangkok, and that’s why Ise never approached this topic directly.10 He placed snippets of his experience in his installation as evidence of what he had encountered each day. The “popcorn gunman” became an unlikely folk hero to ZH: Do you think you have anything else to supporters of the People’s Democratic Reform Committee elaborate that has not been fruitfully addressed in this interview? (PDRC) when Vivat Yodprasit opened fire during a confrontation between the Red Shirts and the PDRC on 1 AF: It’s too personal… You know, I still send February 2014, wounding three and killing one standing on messages to Ise even after he passed away. If I find the side of the Red Shirt. His gun, an M16 rifle, was concealed something interesting, I will send him a message. in a yellow and green popcorn bag that became a rather Because we were so used to sending each other short-lived symbol of resistance. In 2018, Vivat Yodprasit was messages. At the beginning it was via email, then sentenced to a 37-year prison term. The yellow and green it was the Messenger. The Messenger helped a lot, “popcorn army” image as reproduced by Ise in this drawing because after a few months, Ise would reappear with the message “brother, I’m back.” Everytime he was quite widely disseminated in popular culture. came back from the hospital, he would write me Courtesy of Ark Fongsmut. 8 Yingluck Shinawatra’s rise to premiership was chiefly attributed to her populist rice-pledging scheme. She was eventually deposed in 2014 by the Constitutional Court for dereliction of duty, two weeks before the army launched its 12th military coup in Thailand. 9 One of the biggest mysteries in aviation history, MH370 (Malaysian Airline Flight 370) was a Boeing 777 that had disappeared into the Indian Ocean on 8 March 2014. For a critical commentary and discussion of existing data, see William Langewiesche, “What Really Happened to Malaysia’s Missing Airplane,” The Atlantic (June 17, 2019), retrieved from: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/mh370-malaysia- airlines/590653/. 10 Ise’s comical approach and indirect attitude towards politics are favourably received by Ark. Less optimistic is artist and writer Hasnul J. Saidon, who considers Ise’s works to be “extremely raw and purposely unoriginal,” at times risk giving an impression of “being ridiculed for taking such an issue too seriously.” Earlier, in 2005, Hasnul was invited by artist Azizan Paiman and Ise to “write something” for their duo exhibition Lightweight vs Heavyweight (2005) at Maya Gallery, where he advised both artists to produce “a more comprehensive recollection” instead of “an aberrant fluctuation in a form of drawing exposition.” See Hasnul J. Saidon, “A Letter to Noor Azizan Paiman and Roslisham Ismail” in Lightweight vs Heavyweight, exhibition catalogue (Kuala Lumpur: Maya Gallery, 2005); Hasnul J. Saidon, “A ‘Filtered’ Overview of Recent Works by 11 Contemporary Malaysian Artists” in Filtered, exhibition catalogue (Kuala Lumpur: Wei-Ling Gallery, 2007). 28 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

that message. He did that once using email and So I still send messages to Ise from time to time, despite twice in the Messenger. And the last was when he knowing that he cannot answer me. It’s a very intimate said he couldn’t do it anymore. I sent him a message feeling. As you know, when I curated Kentaro Hiroki’s while I was travelling, “hey, when are you coming Malaysian Citizenship at A+ Works of Art two years ago, to Bangkok?” And he said maybe he couldn’t come I managed to travel to Kuala Lumpur. Ise came over just here anymore. “I cannot fly, Ark,” that’s what he said. to meet me, all the way from Kelantan. Ise and I, we did I told him “don’t say that.” I always tried to cheer him not develop a relationship as artist and curator, but as up about his health. friends, as part of a family. Ark Fongsmut currently serves as a lecturer in the Department of Fine Arts at King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Lardkrabang. His curatorial practice started in 2000 as a curator for the Bangkok University Gallery, during which he produced significant exhibitions and initiated the Brand New Project and the Artist/Curator Residency Programme. With expertise in Thai photography, he has curated several photography biennales and festivals, including Month of Photography—Bangkok, Singapore International Photography Festival (SIPF), Photo Bangkok. With a number of overseas institutions, he has co-curated biennials and festivals including the Sea Art Festival of Busan Biennale in 2008, and Singapore Biennale, If the World Changed, in 2013. Ark is also a recipient of the Silpakorn Award, conferred by the Office of Contemporary Art and Culture, Ministry of Culture. Tan Zi Hao is an artist, writer, and researcher whose ideas have taken shape across a diverse range of topics involving soil ecology, language politics, interpretive etymology, and mythical chimeras. Informed by the political contestation of identity vis-à-vis the nation-state, his works question cultural essentialism and sovereignty by privileging the assemblage. He completed his Ph.D. in Southeast Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore, undertaking fieldwork research on animal imagery in the Islamic art of Cirebon. His writings have appeared in journals including Indonesia and the Malay World, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, and numerous exhibition catalogues and online platforms. He has had a solo exhibition and several group exhibitions including ILHAM Contemporary Forum (2017), Singapore Biennale: An Atlas of Mirrors (2016), and others. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 29

Let’s Detox: In Dialogue with Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin Tan Zi Hao An incredible willingness to share, an indomitable to instigate dialogues. “Santai ajelah” (just relax), curiosity to learn from and to connect with others, he reminded us in the midst of a merciless debate were the driving motivation of Ise’s practice. about his work.2 Between periods of his residencies and projects abroad, his homecomings were often celebrated It is not by coincidence that some of Ise’s early works by some chattering, by what he called a “detox” were decried as utter rubbish (sampah). Perhaps session, as longtime personal friend and curator detoxification leads inescapably to excretion, to the Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin relates. “Detox” is discharge of wastes. Of all works, Ise’s daring 3m Ise’s informal sharing session held among his close x 3m x 3m = 27m3 (2004) installation received the friends. His knack for creating his own idiom is a crudest of criticisms. A number of commentators familiar habit: “detox” is one, “superfriend” is another. excoriated Ise for piling up carton boxes in the They elevate the prosaic activities of chattering to National Art Gallery in Kuala Lumpur, followed by an something extraordinary. Surely, “detox” added impromptu performance that culminated in a mess a sense of urgency to his impulse to share—as if of crumpled papers. “Do not declare this garbage as a he must rid himself of all that experience he had work of art,” one commentator reminded the gallery, accumulated overseas.1 A casual urgency, no less, “[t]he junior artists will follow suit! And Malaysian art since Ise always appeared effortless in his ability will become absolute rubbish.”3 1 To travel overseas was part of Ise’s modus operandi. Titling his artist residency exhibition in Sydney as “Keluar 90 Hari” (90-Day Outing) made clear the importance of departing from one’s comfort zone. The term “keluar” may also connote the idea of spiritual self-discovery, as critic Zulkifli Mohamad has suggested in his review of Ise’s exhibition: “Istilah ini juga mempunyai konotasi tersendiri di kalangan para pendakwah yang keluar dari rumahnya untuk menyucikan diri serta mencari ilmu baru.” Zulkifli Mohamad, “Pelayaran Tukang Cerita,” Svarnabhumi Studio—Kuala Lumpur: Contemporary Dance, Theatre & Performance Body, (December 31, 2006), retrieved from: http://svarnabhumi.blogspot.com/2006/12/pelayaran- tukang-cerita.html. 2 An online comment posted by Ise at Kakiseni, documented by Nur Hanim in her zine sendawa!. See Godmama [Nur Hanim Khairuddin], “Taji Kotak dalam Wacana Estetik Garbologi,” sendawa! (2004). 3 The installation was largely a response to the regulation of the Young Contemporary Awards competition organised biannually by the National Art Gallery. The competition required artwork dimensions to be restricted to 3m x 3m x 3m. As a retort, Ise built a 27m3 cube made out of carton boxes, papers, and newspapers he had collected over two months. The cube construction was fragile and it could not last for the entire exhibition period lasting three months. Hence, Ise invited his friends to demolish the structure, creating a mess in a national institution. The entire process was documented in a two-channel video using a screen no bigger than the stipulated dimensions. The comment, translated in English here, was originally posted at Kakiseni: “Jangan iktirafkan sampah-sampah itu sebagai karya seni! Ini akan menjadi ikutan artists junior! Dan Malaysian art akan jadi sampah akhirnya!” See sendawa! (2004). 30 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, 3m x 3m x 3m = 27m3, 2004, performance and mixed media installation. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. In defense of Ise’s work, Nur Hanim wrote a sharp- Tan Zi Hao (TZH): You graduated from the School of witted essay “Taji Kotak dalam Wacana Estetik Art and Design of Institut Teknologi MARA—now the Garbologi” (2004), published in her zine sendawa!.4 Faculty of Art and Design, Universiti Teknologi MARA She vindicated Ise’s installation through the optic of (UiTM)—in 1994, when Ise was about to begin his “garbology,” wherein garbage is viewed not as useless education at the same university (1994–1997). Did discards but as a redemption of ideas that have been you already know him by then or way before? What marginalised and forgotten by official narratives.5 The was your first meaningful engagement with Ise? essay brought Nur Hanim in closer contact with Ise and it set in motion a series of meetings that led to the Nur Hanim Khairuddin (NHK): At UiTM, Ise was my eventual founding of sentAp!. Nur Hanim’s sendawa!— junior but we didn’t actually cross paths. I didn’t described as “a kind of punk zine for Malaysian art know him until 2002. We met during the installation world”—is really the precursor of sentAp!.6 of my work for the Young Contemporary Awards at the National Art Gallery.7 Ise was one of the artists In the following interview, Nur Hanim gives a who submitted a proposal. His proposal got rejected, perceptive account of her enduring friendship but despite that he still came to the gallery almost with Ise. The nature of their collaboration in everyday. The finalists had about a week to install sentAp! is made clear, fascinating biographical the artworks, artists like Yap Sau Bin and Azizan snippets of Ise’s concerns and methodologies Paiman were there too. We had to basically set up too are revealed, altogether offering invaluable for the Young Contemporary Awards exhibition. Ise afterthoughts about Ise’s character as a whole. was there and he was just hanging around, getting to Let the “detox” begin! know different people. And during that short period, 4 Godmama [Nur Hanim Khairuddin], “Taji Kotak dalam Wacana Estetik Garbologi,” sendawa! (2004); reprinted in Nur Hanim Khairuddin, Euforia: Selonggok Retorik Nur Hanim Khairuddin Tentang Seni (Penang: Muzium & Galeri Tuanku Fauziah, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 2010), pp. 47–58. 5 Godmama [Nur Hanim Khairuddin], “Taji Kotak dalam Wacana Estetik Garbologi,” sendawa! (2004). 6 Nur Hanim Khairuddin, “ ‘My’ Alternative Voice for Malaysian Art: From Sendawa to sentAp!,” in Euforia: Selonggok Retorik Nur Hanim Khairuddin Tentang Seni (Penang: Muzium & Galeri Tuanku Fauziah, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 2010), p. 136. The paper was first presented in the conference “Fragrance of Difference” in 2008, at ifa-Galerie, Stuttgart, Germany. 7 Nur Hanim Khairuddin’s entry was Laga-Laga (2002), a provocative installation that included more than two hundred living betta fish juxtaposed with images of warfare and death. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 31

we had quite a lot of conversations, very casual and relaxed sort of conversations about his direction in art-making. TZH: I suppose that is very telling of his practice Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Outdoor Classroom, 1997, tables, chairs, too. Having conversations is always part of his metal wires. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. thought process, which prioritised open-ended and process driven experiments. Were you aware of this TZH: Ise seemed not to have a very positive experience inclination of his during the earlier years? What were locally. Acerbic criticism of his works among his the pedagogical and artistic contexts back at UiTM? colleagues and peers greatly contributed to that. His institutional environment did not seem to be very “Since graduating,” Ise professed, “my artwork had supportive of his venture, yet—or perhaps due to this not been well-received and I thought I had come to alienation—he had a penchant to reach out and to a dead-end in my work.”8 To give another inkling of generate dialogues with the others, as epitomised in the discouragement he had to digest back home, his Outdoor Classroom (1997), and later The Story Behind reflection on his residency at Sydney in 2006 was The Social Ills (2000), and quite representationally, telling: “The warm welcome by people in Sydney made Place of Unity (2001). me feel at home. I was amazed and amused by remarks from people back home saying that I would be out of NHK: I couldn’t be sure because I was not with him place at this residency.”9 Being out-of-place had been during his stint at UiTM. But during my time, that kind a recurring facet in Ise’s practice. Could you shed of approach in art-making was readily accepted by more light on Ise’s general disinclination to stay put in our lecturers, which included Hasnul J. Saidon and Malaysia? Sulaiman Esa. In fact, they pushed for it, which is why I tried to break away from paintings then. If you look at Matahati’s generation or mine, we have that same spirit, we wanted to depart from the conventional ways of making art. So we produced that kind of work already and we didn’t face any serious issues. But being his personal friend, Ise did inform me that NHK: I think it was largely due to the form of his his presentation had received criticism. Though I think artworks. Malaysia back then lacked infrastructures, be generally as an artist, you have to accept criticism. Not they galleries or art spaces, that could accommodate everyone will commend you for what you do. Maybe Ise’s installation. He liked to produce participatory some of the lecturers who taught Ise were a little works, many of which were large-scale and process- orthodox, but I couldn’t really pinpoint who exactly based, so sometimes the existing commercial gallery were them. system could not tolerate them. He would try to find his 8 Enoch Cheng, “Interview with Roslisham Ismail (a.k.a. Ise),” Asia Art Archive, 1 June 2011, retrieved from: https://aaa.org.hk/en/ideas/ideas/ interview-with-roslisham-ismail-a-k-a-ise. 9 Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, “Go Out for 90 Days (Keluar 90 Hari),” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 9, no. 3 (2008): 423; Ise, “Keluar 90 Hari,” artist’s book, 2006. 32 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

own solution by widening his social networks and by There was a constant dynamic between his experiences engaging with other parties outside Malaysia. As far as I at home and abroad. To your understanding, what was can remember, several parties were actually interested Ise seeking and what came out of that friction? to feature his works, but Ise himself declined them. He had very specific targets and visions. Whenever his NHK: As mentioned earlier, I think Ise had his own works were exhibited, he wanted a publication, and his strategy. Maybe he wanted to first exhibit his works works must be elevated in such a way that they could outside of Malaysia, to get some mileage before become more meaningful. He refused to participate in returning home. This was also tied to the lack of an exhibition just for the sake of displaying his works. consistent art writings and exhibition reviews in the Malaysian art scene. It was not that he didn’t want to His objective was also to expand his own social exhibit in Malaysia. I think it’s really up to him to do networks, which was why he did his parkingproject; what he wanted here. Alternative art spaces such as not to mention his networks of superfriends, which Rumah Air Panas (est. 1997) and Lostgens’ (est. 2004) consisted of quite influential curators and artists in the have already existed during his time. Later on, he also region! I think he was very clever in placing himself in did his solo exhibition Ghost (2010) in an abandoned the art map. Everyone can be an artist, but to be the space at Jalan Mesui.11 Options were there. artist, you have to be supported by the others, and he was aware of that. Through his parkingproject, artists and curators would come and stay at his place. Sau Bin was with him too, and like tour guides, they drove people around Kuala Lumpur and invited them over to meet various stakeholders in the arts. So they provided this informal service to the project and it was very relaxed and homely. I believe this was the main reason why the project had succeeded, and consequently, it paved the way for Ise’s entry into the art world in the region. TZH: To some extent, by situating himself in the Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Ghost, 2010, site-specific sound art map, he indirectly contributed to repositioning installation. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. Malaysian art in the region. Through his itinerant career, he was looking for a change. One could easily recall his In fact, we had a discussion about doing a retrospective dissatisfaction about the local art scene—when he was show for him in Malaysia. My husband Syed Omar about to return to Malaysia from his Sydney residency, Husain and I were telling Ise that it was a pity Malaysians he claimed to have experienced “queries and doubts,” couldn’t see his works because he was always exhibiting bewailing the “not-so-exciting” art scene in Malaysia.10 abroad, so we asked that he bring his works back and to prepare for a show here. He was agreeable to that. 10 Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, “Go Out for 90 Days (Keluar 90 Hari),” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 9, no. 3 (2008): 421. 11 Held from 16 to 18 April 2010, Ghost presented a soundscape consisting of voices from a considerable amount of artists, curators, lecturers, bloggers, and children, responding to a series of artworks Ise had produced during his bouts of insomnia. The nature of the project was highly collaborative, it was co-curated by Eva McGovern and Vincent Leong and involved members from local punk rock bands, Bullet (Carburetor Dung) and Bob Magnus (The Pilgrims). See Eva McGovern, “Ghost Stories,” Arteri, 5 May 2010, retrieved from: http://arteri.search-art.asia/2010/05/05/ spectral-nights/; Vincent Leong, “GHOST: by Roslisham Ismail @ Ise,” Something in Nothing: The Works of Vincent Leong, 14 June 2011, retrieved from: http://somethinginnothing.blogspot.com/2011/06/ghost-by-roslisham-ismail-ise.html. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 33

We even spoke about publishing a big book on Ise, but went to the National Art Gallery to meet Zanita Anuar then you know… who was heading the publication department. We told her that we needed some support to print the magazine TZH: Speaking of publication, you and Ise founded and they gave us RM5,000 as the seed money, which sentAp! in 2005. Both of you had shared interest in was understandable because we haven’t started the making zines, but initiating sentAp! was an entirely project, it was just a proposal. We took the money, and different ball game, it was ambitious in scope. How did through Ise’s contacts, invited writers from Indonesia it all begin? Thailand and others. I would email them personally to invite them to contribute to the magazine. The writers NHK: Let me begin by mentioning Ise’s installation 3m were not paid, many worked on a pro-bono basis as it x 3m x 3m = 27m3 (2004), which was his breakthrough, was largely based on the mutual intention to promote if I may say so. Firstly, it is the form of the work, which the arts in the region. So the first issue of sentAp! was is quite unusual by itself; and secondly, the discourse more of an introduction of the art scenes in respective that was generated because of the work. There were countries. heated debates about the installation at Kakiseni. Some were badmouthing the work, some others were more TZH: We know that you are the editor-in-chief for supportive. I personally wrote a special article to defend sentAp!. Ise, on the other hand, considered his role to Ise’s work in my own zine called sendawa!, which is an be “not a critical one” and stated that he was the person acronym for “Seni dalam Wacana” (Art in Discourse). who “runs the magazine” without much specification.13 During art openings, I would distribute the zine to artist Could you share with us the exact responsibilities of Ise friends and art collectors. I was not in close contact and yourself in this project? with Ise at that time, but of course this event made us closer. For me, the work was really contemporary and NHK: Because of his social networks, Ise was mostly he was very advanced in his thinking. He was perhaps responsible for inviting potential contributors abroad. 10 to 15 years ahead of his time!12 But he also contributed his time to monitor the design of the magazine, he would supervise the designer. TZH: That’s really fascinating, could you tell us more And whenever the magazines were printed, it was his about the content of the article? role to market them. He would carry a few copies of sentAp! when he travelled abroad, giving them mostly NHK: I couldn’t remember, but it’s generally about to curators and art writers. That’s how we built our “garbologi,” about garbage, something like that. That brand. After a while, we got invited to participate in the was in 2004. And it was largely because of this instance documenta 12 Magazine Project (2006), a project of that led to the founding of sentAp! in 2005. Ise saw my the documenta 12 (2007). My part was to take care of DIY zine, and then we had more discussion, we felt that the editorial and to get sufficient funding by persuading a platform was needed to discuss and criticise artworks various art institutions to buy our advertising space. in Malaysia. Ise also brought back the Broadsheet Journal from Sydney as an example for our magazine. TZH: What was the nature of this collaboration? How We ended up discussing for a few months. Then we were the contents and the direction of sentAp! discussed, 12 Writing under the pseudonym “Godmama,” Nur Hanim commented at Kakiseni that the installation was “beyond Bakat Muda Sezaman. It should be categorised [as] Bakat Muda Berzaman-zaman.” Godmama [Nur Hanim Khairuddin], “Taji Kotak dalam Wacana Estetik Garbologi,” sendawa! (2004). 13 Enoch Cheng, “Interview with Roslisham Ismail (a.k.a. Ise),” Asia Art Archive, 1 June 2011, retrieved from: https://aaa.org.hk/en/ideas/ideas/ interview-with-roslisham-ismail-a-k-a-ise. 34 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

curated, or decided? Do you recall any interesting and retrospective, are all clear indications of the unilateral memorable snippets in these discussions with Ise? flow of influence that is steering the discourse of contemporary art.15 Ise’s itinerant career, from his NHK: Both of us agreed that we wanted to encourage biennale participation to artist residencies across the more new writers and curators and to elevate the globe, is seldom discussed through this framework. With Malaysian art scene through discourse. I think we the benefit of hindsight, did Ise’s reputation coincide succeeded in introducing several, such as Safrizal with what was in vogue in the global art market? What Shahir, Sarena Abdullah, just to name a few, as sentAp! was Ise’s position amid this nexus of influence? was the first publication that featured their writings. We also wanted to prioritise contemporary artworks, NHK: I believe he must have been aware of the niche. that’s why we often went to independent spaces and Ise had his strategy, he wanted to travel and to do artist provided media coverage for their shows. But we also residencies abroad as much as possible, he wanted to listed out the commercial galleries at the back of our gain different experiences. We once had a conversation magazine as we wanted readers to get a sense of where he was questioning why some artists often what’s happening in the Malaysian art scene. We were talked about wars, when they never went to nor had quite ambitious back then. I am actually very proud that they experienced them. As an artist, Ise would only this collaboration took place. We were even able to commit to something he was involved in, which was upgrade the magazine. It started out thin and floppy, why when he talked about his own works, he was very like an underground publication, but it developed into it, because he would know every single detail since into something that looked great. We even got the it was reflective of his encounters. approval from KDN (Ministry of Home Affairs), the ISSN (International Standard Serial Number), because I consider Ise to be among the rare breed of artists without the permission, we couldn’t distribute our whose works are highly experimental and participatory. magazines to major bookstores.14 I think starting from Not many artists share an approach such as his. He also the seventh issue, we were able to do that. delved deep into his own cultural and societal contexts. For each of his works, he put 100% of his time in the TZH: As an art-writer-cum-curator yourself, how research first. I was with him for the last few years while would you position Ise’s work in the course of Malaysian he was working on the Langkasuka Cookbook (2013) art history, considering the problematic of nationalistic project. When Ise told me and my other half about this art-historiographical frameworks? In asking this new project of his, we instantaneously recommended question, I also wish to allude to the inevitable fact that to him to find Azzaha Ibrahim, a Kelantanese architect contemporary art is deeply entrenched in the unequal who for many years was doing serious research on the power relations between the local and the global, cultural landscape of Langkasuka. They eventually met characteristic of the structures of capitalism. That Ise’s up in Kota Bharu, Kelantan, and became really close. reputation came belated in the local arena, that he had Azzaha brought Ise to Pattani many times, travelled to to exhibit abroad before returning to Malaysia for a different kampungs and conducted interviews with the 14 See also Nur Hanim Khairuddin, “ ‘My’ Alternative Voice for Malaysian Art: From Sendawa to sentAp!,” in Euforia: Selonggok Retorik Nur Hanim Khairuddin Tentang Seni (Penang: Muzium & Galeri Tuanku Fauziah, Universiti Sains Malaysia, 2010), p. 138. 15 “Ise’s practice was better appreciated outside of rather than within Malaysia. Despite his thirty-year curriculum vitae deserving much more recognition at home.” Lienne Loy, “Drifting,” in Azizan Paiman: Aku Ini Binatang Jalang, exhibition catalogue (Kuala Lumpur: A+ Works of Art, 2020). sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 35

people. On one occasion, even artist Chang Fee Ming TZH: Perhaps his blog was an exemplification of that [known for his Langkasuka paintings] tagged along to tendency to document his own repertoire. “Selfish, join in their quite challenging trip to the Southern Thai. opportunist and most of the time is [sic] stupid” was how he described himself in his blog Muggo,16 which was the name of his alter-ego in Super Fiction (2008). As his personal friend, what do you think was lurking in the midst of the mysterious dark shadows pervasive in this series? The motif of superheroism and the use of hyperbole, such as “Super Fiction” and “superfriends,” were prevalent in Ise’s everyday expression. Was this style of expression acquired from his fancy with comics? Or do you identify a strategic element of escapism in his commitment to art? Roslisham Ismail aka Ise during his research in Pattani, together with Azzaha Ibrahim and Chang Fee Ming, for Langkasuka Cookbook, 2013. Courtesy of Azzaha Ibrahim. I think this processual approach greatly enriches his works as there are a lot more interesting things to be mulled over and talked about. His artworks are not just a visual feast, they consist of stories to be told. Even though his doodles are strictly two dimensional, they hold a repository of stories and ideas. Not many artists in Malaysia have that stamina to invest money, time, and energy, just for the sake of conducting proper research. Ise was also very serious about documentation. For Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Super Fiction, 2008, collage. Courtesy of most of his works, he would appoint a team, usually Ise parkingproject Foundation. a few of his superfriends, to ensure that his works and the process were diligently documented. In the last few years, he began to emphasise on video-recording his process. He made sure that all of his works must be remembered through all the documentation and writings, and that includes the criticism levelled against his works, because when others comment and criticise your works, they will remember them. He was a good businessman! He always said to me “I am an opportunist, I don’t care what people said.” 16 Ise, Muggo, 2009–2018. Retrieved from: http://muggo.blogspot.com/. 36 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, DEB (Dasar Ekonomi Baru/New Economic Policy), 2009, illegal money lender business cards and stickers. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. NHK: Maybe, it can be seen as a form of escapism TZH: The blog also reveals Ise’s desire to document his because the character Muggo represents all the works and travel experience, echoing his visual journals bad vibes that had been haunting him. Most of them typically filled with collage composed of images and were related to his art career, his bad experiences, memorabilia culled from his wayward journeys. This the criticism against his works, all the tragedies that proclivity is quite apparent in works such as DEB/ had happened to him17 in the Malaysian art scene. In NEP (2009) and Secret Affair (2011), which present his this sense, Muggo can be a form of escapism, and by collected materials in the form of an assemblage.18 depicting the character in his works, he wanted to be strong. But again, that is just our assumption. Maybe Ise Likewise, Ise’s personal space where he did the had a darkside that we simply do not know! parkingproject was plastered with posters. His passion 17 See also Ise’s artist’s book Super Fiction, which contains a fictional essay relating the story of Muggo, Keiko, and Robotic Dog, written by Nur Hanim. 18 It is worth noting that Ise’s DEB (Dasar Ekonomi Baru/New Economic Policy) (2009) was made in response to a violent incident in his neighbourhood in Kuala Lumpur involving illegal loan sharks. First produced in 2007, the collage has had different variations. See Agung Hujatnikajenong, “Roslisham Ismail,” in Arena: Jakarta Biennale 2009 (Jakarta: Dewan Kesenian Jakarta, 2009), p. 110. The collage was a commentary on Malaysia’s New Economic Policy (NEP). Formulated in 1970 after the controversial 1969 riot, it is a race-based affirmative action policy aimed at rectifying economic disparities between Bumiputra and non-Bumiputra. The policy lasted until 1990, when it was replaced by the National Development Policy in 1991. For a balanced and substantiated analysis of the policy, see Edmund Terence Gomez and Johan Saravanamuttu (eds.), The New Economic Policy in Malaysia: Affirmative Action, Ethnic Inequalities and Social Justice (Singapore: NUS Press, 2013). sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 37

for documenting and collecting was integral to his always very happening. I think Ise had a big contribution practice. Could you tell us what he enjoyed collecting to quite a number of young artists, because he was and how this impulse had influenced his projects? willing to share, so there was a pool of people fortunate enough to be around him and they learned from his NHK: Yes, he really was a hoarder. He collected a lot experience. of shoes, transportation tickets, paper and plastic bags. And posters, of course, he was an ardent collector His “detox” sessions usually had about seven people, of art exhibition posters. From his travels, he would including Yan, the designer from sentAp!, and also bring back anything that could remind him of specific Bob Magnus, one of the band members from The moments. All these definitely add up to his mode of Pilgrims, who is also a photographer. And lately, making art. Especially through his parkingproject, he for the Langkasuka Cookbook project, he bumped created opportunities for exchange. into another team of people in Kelantan, so that became his group. Eventually it was this group of Whenever Ise returned from abroad having completed people who would represent Ise when he fell sick. his projects outside, he would hold a “detox” session, They would travel for him, install and explain his as he called it, where he would sit down and share his works to other people, but they were not artists experience. He also made a trip to our place at Ipoh. themselves. So Ise was like that, when he met new We focussed on talking about his works and his plan, people, he would chat with them and if it felt right about how exhibitions and contemporary arts beyond or comfortable, he would expand from there. It’s his Malaysia were like. So everyone in the session acquired personality, everywhere he went, a new network of new information. It felt like having an informal art collaborations and friendships were forged. He was education, there was exchange of ideas and it was gifted to have that persona. Nur Hanim Mohamed Khairuddin is an artist and independent curator based in Ipoh, Perak in Malaysia. She graduated with a BFA from Universiti Teknologi MARA Malaysia, in 1994 and has participated in numerous exhibitions locally and internationally. From 1996 to 2010, she was a curator at Perak Arts Foundation, and was responsible for organising the annual multi-disciplinary International Ipoh Arts Festival (1996–2000). As a freelance curator, she has curated solo exhibitions for prominent Malaysian artists such as Shia Yih Yiing, Raja Shahriman Raja Aziddin and Ali Rahamad. She was also responsible for the curation of two major restrospectives, namely Raj’aah: Sulaiman Esa (2011) and Bumi Larangan: Zulkifli Dahlan (2017), both of which were held at the National Art Gallery, Malaysia. In 2014, she spearheaded the archiving team for the Ismail Hashim Estate. She was an associate curator for the 5th edition of the Singapore Biennale (Singapore) and the Kuandu Biennale (Taiwan) in 2016. Together with Beverly Yong, Nur Hanim is the co-editor-in-chief for the four-volume Narratives in Malaysian Art, and currently one of the directors for the Malaysian Art Archive & Research Support (MARS) in Kuala Lumpur. She was a member of the Industry Advisory Panel of the Cultural Economic Development Agency (CENDANA) and in March 2019, was as General Manager for PORT, a Perak state creative agency. 38 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

That Indescribable Magic: In Dialogue with Russell Storer Tan Zi Hao For one who carries the “tag [of ‘superfriend’] with living in the hearts of many. “He is very much missed,” pride,” curator Russell Storer’s occasional hesitance the interview concludes. in his response gives an unexpected surprise. When prompted for his view on Ise’s amicable character, his In the following conversation, Russell’s answers answers are straightforward, sincere, yet consisting provide an immersive reading experience to Ise’s of brief pauses, giving an impression of being Keluar 90 Hari (2006) and Langkasuka Cookbook inconclusive. “I don’t know,” he claims, “it was his (2012), for they enliven Ise’s visual fête, respectively personality, so engaging and open. I think he was able produced for his residency at the Gunnery Visual to make every simple thing special. Every encounter, Arts Centre and for the 7th Asia Pacific Triennial of every new experience appears kind of magical.” Contemporary Art (APT7). In both events and further, Russell played key roles in realising and maximising And magic it is. Russell’s recollection of Ise is never Ise’s potential, directly shaping his future reputation short of warmth. His patchy response is not a sign of in the contemporary art world. As a superfriend who evasive prevarication, but one of close acquaintance had accompanied Ise in numerous projects, Russell with Ise. It is not uncommon that we often struggle becomes an insightful oral commentator in this to find accurate words to describe people closest to conversation, elucidating Ise’s anxiety and wariness us. For fear of misrepresenting the people we care for during his multiple sojourns in Australia. Snippets of deeply, language could betray us. The kind of “magic” personal memory, now detailed from the viewpoint Ise had imparted to his superfriends is meaningfully of Russell, could tangentially illuminate the vibrant indescribable. But by and large, the loss in his pages of Keluar 90 Hari and Langkasuka Cookbook, passing remains too fresh, so much so that attempts offering an experience of déjà vu through Russell’s to objectively reflect on his approach and career, reminiscence of Ise’s journeys of self-discovery. 1 inevitably brings us back to personal memories still Quite frequently, the conversation recedes into a 1 Adeline Ooi views Keluar 90 Hari as a “faithful companion on heuristic journeys of self-discovery in exotic far off locations.” It would not be unreasonable to extrapolate Ooi’s observation to Ise’s subsequent artist books. Adeline Ooi, untitled article, in Keluar 90 Hari (2006), unpaginated. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 39

recollection of Ise’s generous personality. Russell entrenched in transnational mobilities, it would be speaks of Ise’s “rhizomatic approach to building a interesting to get a sense of how Ise’s oeuvre unfolded community around him” and how this translates into according to the various meetings and encounters, the artist’s very own aesthetic imperatives—something usually incidental, that had led him to his creative magical and conceptually profound is represented vocation and achievement. in the way he weaved his narratives. This aesthetics at times involves a performative element transpiring Russell Storer (RS): I met Ise in Sydney. He participated beyond the actual exhibition. His Langkasuka in the Artspace residency programme through the Cookbook project, for instance, presents a complex Australian High Commission in Kuala Lumpur in mid- embodiment of smell and taste, of memories and 2006. You’ve probably read the artist book produced imagery, in addition to the pleasures of conviviality for that residency.3 It was Fieke Geerts—our mutual and companionship, altogether signalling a form of friend—who introduced us to each other. At that point, synaesthetics at work.2 To what extent could this magic I was a curator at Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary be arrested in words remains a mystery, but Russell’s Art Australia. Fieke knew of my interest in Southeast oft-repeated “sense of wonder” in this interview is not Asian art as I had recently curated a show with The too distant from the experience. Artists Village.4 So, Ise and I met, quite socially. I then took Ise to one of the conferences organised for the It is in this interview alone that one could begin to grasp 15th Biennale of Sydney, where I introduced him to that ineffable feeling. This magic of indescribability Simryn Gill. They became good friends as well. At a marks nothing less than a gap between the experience later date, Simryn and I both went to his studio at his of actually knowing Ise vis-à-vis that of viewing his residency at Artspace. He was throwing a party there, works, across a distance at present widened by his with the walls collaged with drawings and posters. absence. Reading an interview with a superfriend of Ise That was the artwork: some of the photos are at the hitherto presents a critical opening for a connection back of the artist’s book. Around then but slightly later, yet to come, if one wills, since that which escapes Ise also had his first solo exhibition at Gallery 4A.5 the immediacy of language or knowledge—“I don’t know”—often doubles as a promise for the future. So we spent quite a lot of time together in Sydney Such is the gift of Ise: a future of relating, a future of during that period. The following year, 2007, I went to learning and unlearning among ourselves. Kuala Lumpur and stayed with Ise at Parkingproject. As he would often do with people, he took me on a crazy Tan Zi Hao (TZH): Shall we begin with how you came drive, to Ipoh, together with a friend of his who was a to know Ise? For an artist whose practice was deeply curator at the Balai. I recall Hanim was hosting an event 2 Commenting on Ise’s Langkasuka project, Francis Maravillas notes that the cookbook’s “performativity” stems from the “actual, ‘hands-on’ preparation, making and consumption of the food” through which he enabled participants of his events to enter into reciprocity, into “a form of sensuous and sensory connectivity with others.” Francis Maravillas, “The Unexpected Guest: Food and Hospitality in Contemporary Asian Art,” in Michelle Antoinette and Caroline Turner (eds.), Contemporary Asian Art and Exhibitions: Connectivities and World-Making (Canberra: ANU Press, 2014), p. 177. 3 Ise, “Keluar 90 Hari,” artist’s book, 2006. 4 The Artists Village from Singapore was invited to participate in the exhibition “Situation: Collaborations, Collectives and Artist Networks From Sydney, Singapore, Berlin,” held on 6 June–21 August 2005 at the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia. The show provided a critical opportunity for artists and art collectives from the three urban centres to reflect upon the social milieu from which their practices emerged. 5 Gallery 4A was launched in 1997 as part of the Asian Australian Artists Association (AAAA). At its inception, the institution was inevitably marked by Australia’s pivot towards Asia, in tune with the then Prime Minister Paul Keating’s vision of “repositioning Australia within Asian geographies and cultural imaginary.” Subsequent shifts in Australia’s domestic politics and geopolitical concerns heralded a more nuanced engagement with the notion of Asia. Michelle Antoinette. “A space for ‘Asian-Australian’ art: Gallery 4A at The Asia-Australia Arts Centre,” Journal of Australian Studies 32, 4 (2008): 533. 40 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

for sentAp! in Ipoh. It was during Ramadan, so I was But he decided to make a work out of this, to overturn the only one eating, no one else was! The whole event that negativity. He was determined to use his social was in Malay, so I couldn’t understand a word, but it approach to make the residency a part of his project was fantastic to experience the sense of community about how to make friends, how to work against that there. Ise was really generous, obviously very warm isolation he was afraid of. and welcoming, and we just continued meeting up whenever I was in town. The next time we spent a lot TZH: Artists are not always sociable creatures, myself of time together was in 2011, for the third edition of the included! Ise’s personality or philosophy was uniquely Singapore Biennale, which was the first time I had the peerless in this particular aspect. “Making friends and chance to work with Ise, and then again the following talking to people,” as he asserted elsewhere, “is a part year, for APT7 in Brisbane. The last project was when I of my modus operandi in life.”9 To your understanding, commissioned him to create a rooftop installation for what was his method for approaching the unfamiliar, the National Gallery Singapore in 2015, related to the for breaking the ice? Langkasuka project he did for APT7. RS: Ise had this amazing ability. I don’t know, it was his TZH: Ise voiced his anxiety about isolation during personality, so engaging and open. I think he was able his residency in Sydney. Despite being a socialite, his to make every simple thing special. Every encounter, Sydney’s scrapbook was described as a “mind diary every new experience appeared kind of magical. There that records and traces his fear and loathing”; 6 Ise was this sense of wonder in his approach, because he himself even jotted down a demoralising remark, was curious about everything, about everybody, and probably coming from his more skeptical peers, that attitude drew people to him. I guess he worked advising him: “you might be isolated, that’s what with one person who introduced him to someone people kept warning me!”7 He filled his Gunnery studio else who introduced him to someone else again. He walls with posters to remind him of his own space had this rhizomatic approach to building a community back in Malaysia.8 It was only later that he began to around him. And once people spent time with him, they open up. Based on your observation, what was Ise’s became quite captivated. So I think it is through that experience when he first arrived in Sydney? curiosity, that openness and generosity, that Ise was able to really break through what was perhaps a divide RS: This is an interesting question, in fact, I was trying that others hadn’t been able to breach. Additionally, to recall what Ise had told me while preparing for this his Artspace event was really inviting, there was this conversation. Before he did his residency in Sydney, unstated notion of hospitality in his approach. The he was told that it would be a horrible experience superfriends he met during his residency in Sydney and that people wouldn’t want to talk to him because formed a relationship with him out of a convivial social they wouldn’t be interested. And you know, as a setting. It was a very informal studio visit where people Malaysian, it would be difficult to gain any traction. were just hanging out. It didn’t feel forced. 6 M. Hijaz, “Playground of the Alchemist & Mind Diary,” sentAp!, 6 (May–August 2007): 53–57. 7 Ise, “Keluar 90 Hari,” artist’s book, 2006, unpaginated. 8 M. Hijaz, “Playground of the Alchemist & Mind Diary,” sentAp!, 6 (May–August 2007): 53–57. 9 Enoch Cheng, “Interview with Roslisham Ismail (a.k.a. Ise),” Asia Art Archive (June 1, 2011), retrieved from: hjps://aaa.org.hk/en/ideas/ideas/ interview-with-roslisham-ismail-a-k-a-ise sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 41

TZH: Ise’s ways of working remind me of an emergent had a very informal, almost improvised approach, in tendency among artists around the 2000s to engage addition to having a very strong conceptual brain. For with communities. Artists and cultural workers then him, there was always a purpose, and it would build were attempting to create conditions for encounters, into something. He had a very clear idea of what he and were actively seeking alternative spatial strategies wanted to do. In Singapore, we felt that Ise’s method for making and re-distributing arts beyond the could work as a subtle intervention. You know, confines of the gallery. To name just a few, there were having spent some time here, it’s a place that can be the Taman Medan Community Arts Project (2002) and hard to break into as people might be a little more Ada Apa (2003) by Five Arts Centre, Notthatbalai Arts guarded and reserved.11 But Ise was able to tap into Festival (2004) by Lostgens’, Let Arts Move You (2007) a wide range of resources to initiate an engagement and Contemporary Art in School Project (2008) by with certain families and communities. He was able Rumah Air Panas. I recalled Nicolas Bourriaud’s notion to come up with a very different project and to of relational aesthetics, first proposed in 1998,10 synthesise it in quite a simple manner, and yet it was was referenced widely in some of the discussion visually and aesthetically very powerful. This was really surrounding these projects. Given these various the impetus for inviting him. iterations, perhaps Ise’s ambition could be situated in this wider ecology of ideas? TZH: You mentioned that Ise had a very strong conceptual brain and he was able to formulate ideas RS: Relational aesthetics is a useful term because it in ways that are simple yet powerful. Could you captures a form of practice, but Bourriaud defines elaborate with some examples? it in a rather narrow way, especially in terms of the artists he referred to. Many other artists have been RS: The work 3m x 3m x 3m = 27m3 (2004), which working in that way across different regions for a was produced for the Young Contemporary Awards very long time. Bourriaud was just able to give it a at Balai, stands out. He had just graduated, so was compelling name, and then it becomes a catch-all quite young. For the art prize, Balai had this regulation for everyone who is working on socially-engaged where your artworks cannot exceed the dimensions projects. In a sense, it has co-opted a very diverse of 3m x 3m x 3m, which he thought was ridiculous. range of practices arising from contexts that differ So he created a large cube in those dimensions out substantially. I’m always wary of subsuming artists as of cardboard boxes and trashed it with his friends. It specific as Ise under that rubric. was very playful and simple, very low-fi in a sense. But you know obviously there was a strong critique But I think, certainly, for the Singapore Biennale, Ise’s of the institution, of the structure of the art prize. approach to working with the community was one Underlying his playfulness was a highly valid and solid of the key reasons we invited him. And because he institutional critique.12 I got the sense he was always 10 Relational aesthetics was described as “an art form where the substrate is formed by inter-subjectivity, and which takes being-together as a central theme.” Nicolas Bourriaud’s formulation has since invited numerous criticisms, one of which considers relational aesthetics as “a populism of the multitude,” a post-political ideation that flattens antagonistic dissensus, re-packaging it as “a new consumerist model for counter-culture.” See Nicolas Bourriaud, Relational Aesthetics, translated by Simon Pleasance and Fronza Woods, with the participation of Mathieu Copeland (Dijon: Les presses du réel, 2002), p. 15; Eric Alliez, “Capitalism and Schizophrenia and Consensus: Of Relational Aesthetics,” translated by Tim Adams, in S. Zepke and S. O’Sullivan (eds.), Deleuze and Contemporary Art (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2010), pp. 87, 94. 11 It is worth noting that the Singapore Biennale 2011 was titled “Open House” and had an explicit intent to open up the Singapore city and new possibilities for artistic engagement. 12 More on the work as institutional critique, see Biljana Ciric, “Artists and Institutions: Institution for the Future,” Yishu 11, 5 (2012), pp. 8–10. 42 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

working against the more embedded system in Kuala and I felt terrible. But he came back eventually and we Lumpur in particular. And he felt he was not accepted proceeded to work the way he wanted to work. He by certain artists or institutions, so there was always a had his own designer that he wanted to engage with, pushback in his works. he intended it to be of a particular look, resembling a zine. In the end, we have a fantastic document, filled Another example would be the Langkasuka project with his drawings, and it captures the DIY spirit of Ise. he developed for APT7. Our initial proposal to Ise We devised a display as well, a frieze wall featuring was to make a cookbook, because I knew he had objects and photographs from the project. There was been researching Kelantanese cuisine ever since also a cooking performance that he developed from he moved back to Kelantan around the time of the the recipes. So to return to your question, I guess Ise Singapore Biennale. I was interested in exploring always had a very clear idea of what he wanted, or what was coming out of that, because there was the didn’t want to do, from the very beginning. potential for a lot more research and culturally specific engagement. At the outset, the idea was to produce TZH: The Langkasuka project was a process-oriented a glossy, coffee-table type cookbook. We would work, it involved a multitude of conversations, paying design it and it would be very beautiful, filled with unique attention to knowledge transmitted through very specific recipes that hadn’t been written down oral traditions. Contemplating on the origin of before. But he hated this idea, there was no way he Langkasuka, Azzaha Ibrahim, one of the contributing intended to do anything glossy and slick! We butted authors of Ise’s cookbook, speaks of it as partly heads on that. He even went awol for a while, which historical, partly imaginative. He unravels a narrative was a little bit scary—I was thinking, “oh no, what’s that comes with more mysteries than answers.13 happening with Ise?” because he was a friend as well, Working on the project itself was part of Ise’s process Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, The Langkasuka Cookbook, 2012, commissioned for The 7th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA), Brisbane, 2012. Photograph by Mark Sherwood. Courtesy of QAGOMA. 13 Azzaha Ibrahim, “A Micro Study of Langkasuka,” in Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Langkasuka Cookbook, artist’s book, 2012–2013, pp. 3–14. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 43

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Another Story, 2017, mixed media installation. Courtesy of Ise parkingproject Foundation. of recollection, of embodying the elusive culinary trying to think of a way for Ise’s work (which was really heritage of Langkasuka. In this respect, the subject the cookbook) to have a presence in the gallery. We matter of the project was fundamentally intangible; were trying to find a work that could function in that the cookbook functions like a “sensory archive,”14 space, which was certainly antithetical to Ise’s usual evoking oral histories, personal and cultural memories. form of display, but we worked with him on it. He As the curator, how did you work with Ise in rendering worked on a series of drawings, like a collage, and these processes legible to the audience? For APT7, the long display was reflective of his research journey the panoramic presentation in the Queensland along the way. Later we added more objects in there, Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) we went to different shops around Brisbane, Asian assumed a very formalistic and museological quality, grocery stores, and bought enamel plates and other perhaps indifferent to Ise’s more rhizomatic mode items. I guess it still looked quite slick and refined of navigating narratives and memories, especially because it’s unified behind glass. But that was the apparent in his various installations such as Operation thinking then—how should we work with the space, Bangkok (2014) at BUG, the Langkasuka Cookbook how should we put that particular work, which was (2014) at Galeri Salihara, Another Story (2017) at Mori a research project, on display? Thinking about it now Art Museum, among others. I am sure we could have done it in another way, in another time. The APT7 was a massive show and there RS: That particular space in QAGOMA was always very were so many artists. I guess there were a lot of balls difficult. It was originally intended as a display cabinet to juggle in the air! basically. As you walk into the building, there’s this long glass vitrine built into the wall. It was usually used TZH: I guess another project that could fall under the for artworks, and yes, is a very museological kind of same scrutiny was the Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden display space. And it was always quite challenging to commission, Sira Pisang (2015), at National Gallery find an interesting way to work with it. So we were Singapore,15 which depicted the making of sweet 14 Francis Maravillas, “The Unexpected Guest: Food and Hospitality in Contemporary Asian Art,” in Michelle Antoinette and Caroline Turner (eds.), Contemporary Asian Art and Exhibitions: Connectivities and World-Making (Canberra: ANU Press, 2014), p. 175. 15 Ise’s Sira Pisang was an installation that lasted from 24 November 2015 to 22 April 2016, located at Level 5 of the Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Gallery, National Gallery Singapore. The official promotional blurb for Sira Pisang reads: “This mural depicts how to make sira pisang (glazed banana), Ise’s favourite childhood dish. It reflects Ise’s open approach to art, drawing on popular forms such as comics and graffiti to create a work that audiences can view from above, walk through, or take home to cook for themselves.” National Gallery Singapore, “Sira Pisang by Roslisham Ismail (Ise),” 2015, retrieved from: https://www.nationalgallery.sg/see-do/programme-detail/78/sira-pisang-by-roslisham-ismail-ise 44 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

Roslisham Ismail aka Ise with his artwork Sira Pisang, 2015, wood and paint, dimensions variable. Commissioned by National Gallery Singapore. Photo: Chessa Lim. © National Gallery Singapore. glazed bananas. The recipe essentially belonged to a and the Langkasuka project was at once personal, much broader concern regarding the culinary culture cultural and historical. The space is meant for audience of the Langkasuka. What underpinned the decision engagement as visitors walk in, walk on, walk through. for such a monumental commission, considering the We approached Ise about what he might want to do, nature of Ise’s works which often involved a dialogic and he came up with this idea with a drawing that you and relational approach? Was there any concern as to could walk on basically. So it actually was a work you its final outcome? could engage and interact with, and it was an image that could be viewed from above. The sira pisang or RS: That project was organised quite quickly. We have glazed banana recipe was also one of Ise’s personal this large platform on the Gallery’s rooftop. As you favourites, so the selection of the drawing was rather know, we have developed a series of commissioned straightforward. There wasn’t a huge amount of back projects for this space, working with Danh Vo, Rirkrit and forth. Tiravanija, Charles Lim, and now Cao Fei. This space was empty around the time of the Gallery’s official TZH: You have worked with Ise in both the opening and there wasn’t anything ready at that point, Singapore Biennale and APT7. In both presentations, so we needed to find a work that could be developed he collaborated with chefs who held cooking swiftly. Ise was an artist we enjoyed working with very demonstrations.16 As the curator, did you facilitate this much, and was also chosen because the principle of engagement? What was his rationale for engaging this space is to think about the region in different ways, with a professional chef when his approach was 16 In Singapore, it was David Heng of Food for Thought at 8Q’s restaurant; in Australia, it was Josh Lopez of GOMA Bistro. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 45

often purposefully informal and domestic. Especially create dishes inspired by the items in the refrigerators, for APT7, given the simplicity of the recipe, did his reflecting this very personal, improvised approach. In engagement with chefs complement his method in Brisbane, we held a cooking event in collaboration any manner? with the GOMA restaurant chef, which allowed Ise to share his thoughts, stories and childhood memories RS: Ultimately, I think he just wanted to share his behind the recipe. During the course of the exhibition, recipe with more people! I didn’t work directly with the glazed banana was also on the kid’s menu at the Ise to develop his work for the Singapore Biennale, GOMA café. that was Matthew Ngui. The Singapore project, Secret Affair (2011), was more about uncovering what people Ise was genuinely interested in collaborating with had at home in their refrigerator and what it might different people of varying skill sets. In fact, one of express about them; it’s quite personal and intimate. the reasons he didn’t want to make the cookbook It was held at 8Q, which was structured around a the way we initially wanted him to was because he specific theme, as were the spaces at the Singapore Art said “I am not a professional chef, that’s not me.” But Museum, National Museum, and Old Kallang Airport. he could work with a chef and develop something 8Q looks like an HDB apartment block, so we treated different, translating something that is domestic each of the galleries at 8Q as an “apartment,” with to something more public. I think the idea of the the artworks exhibited there reflecting a domestic or private and public resonates throughout Ise’s work. interior space. The National Museum was conceived His installations gave an impression of his personal around the idea of the urban environment since it was friendships, his connections and experiences, mapped this large, featureless shed-like space like a shopping onto the public space. Hanim has rightly observed, in mall, while the Old Kallang Airport, of course, her essay from Ise’s cookbook, on how he became represents a global transitory space. So Ise’s work more socially engaged as he went on.17 He became was really occupying this “apartment room” at 8Q. more aware of the impact or the context of his work He collaborated with the chef at the 8Q restaurant to the moment he looked deeper into his own culture Roslisham Ismail aka Ise and QAGOMA’s executive chef Josh Lopez during a public cooking demonstration for The 7th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA), Brisbane, 2012. Photograph by Chloë Callistemon. Courtesy of QAGOMA. 17 Nur Hanim Khairuddin’s acute observation is quoted here at length: “While Ise’s previous works are largely based on his own life experiences and personal exchanges, his recent creations seem to be built on a greater awareness of the potential effect of both society and his subject matter on his art and art-making process. Ise’s intuitive and candid interactions with the social, political and cultural realities of his surroundings allow him to identify his artistic oeuvre within the framework of real-life situations. Consequently, his current artistic direction leads him to focus more on public-oriented and socially engaged projects. Moreover, by arranging collaborative programs and interactive events with ordinary people, he hopes to bring contemporary art to those with limited access to its realm.” Nur Hanim Khairuddin, “Returning & Retuning: Ise’s Interaction with His Roots,” in Roslisham Ismail aka Ise, Langkasuka Cookbook, artist’s book, 2012–2013, p. 33. 46 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE

and history. In fact, in the more political work that he artist residencies and biennales. I guess this showed in installed in Galeri Petronas, DEB (Dasar Ekonomi Baru/ his later works, which were much more ambitious and New Economic Policy) (2007), which was a critique on focused. the implementation of the national economic policy, Ise was already making a broader commentary on TZH: Partly because of his artist residency experience his society. So I think there was always this constant abroad, Ise’s works often engage with the other. Do you play between the personal and the public permeating discern, in his works prior to the Langkasuka project, throughout Ise’s works, manifested in different ways a certain ambition on his part, to bring his own world and scales. to the others (not just others to his)? Were Ise’s works almost always xenophilic—such as in Secret Affair TZH: Ise’s works have indeed become more (2011) and Variable Truth (2012)—where he somehow multidimensional, more entangled within the meshes peeked into other people’s personal affairs? of history, if not the intricacy of his personal relations with his family and friends. You have worked with Ise RS: I think he would do that. Certainly with his for an extended period of time, from the Singapore drawings, he would annotate what he found. He Biennale to APT7, what changes have you noticed in always added commentary and wrote over them. his attitude towards art-making? Could you elaborate There was always his own personal take, overlaid on on the shift and the contexts and conditions thereof? whatever he had brought in. For example, by labelling his friends as “superfriends,” they were instantly RS: I think the huge shift was really the moment he brought into his world. There was also a sense of decided to return to his hometown in Kota Bharu. reciprocity. Whenever one visited Kuala Lumpur, The work for the Singapore Biennale was personal but he would look after us at his Parkingproject, and perhaps a little detached. Obviously, he was coming introduce us to others. He provided a place where into a new community, meeting and documenting new anyone could come in, so it was always an open people.18 Whereas for APT7, the work emerged from his invitation. For Secret Affair (2011), Ise chose quite a engagement with his community in Kelantan. He grew diverse range of people. I remember him saying he up there, and it was a process of rediscovering a part wanted to meet particular kinds of people and he of his history that was still mysterious to him. I think had a clear idea about the kinds of families he was returning home definitely shifted his working process, interested to engage with. He wanted people out in and that project continued on in different iterations for the heartlands, he didn’t want to work with friends quite some time as he worked through its implications. of friends, he wanted to go deeper into the fabric of This shift became a trigger for an ongoing investigation. everyday life in Singapore. He spent a lot of time with Over time, his works continued to appear playful the selected families, moving back and forth. They and improvised, somewhat pop, yet became more were people with whom he felt he could connect, or complex, incorporating more found materials and felt that they should be given a space in the exhibition. comic strips. Clearly he also had more opportunities to As you know, Singapore society is rather hierarchical, develop his own approach due to his participation in and he was very keen to cut through that. I think as 18 In several interviews, Ise had considered himself as an “observer” and had once compared his work to “modern anthropology.” Thitipol Panyalimpanun, “Meet the Malaysian multimedia artist spearheading Operation Bangkok,” BK Asia City (May 15, 2014), retrieved from: https:// bk.asia-city.com/events/news/roslisham-ismail-aka-ise-operation-bangkok; Daryl Goh, “Three Malaysian artists shine at Turkey exhibition,” The Star (November 13, 2014); Xiaofei Mo, “Roslisham Ismail a.k.a. Ise: Nasi Kerabu Workshop,” Asian Art Archive (June 8, 2016), retrieved from: http:// www.aaa-a.org/programs/roslisham-ismail-a-k-a-ise-cookbook-workshop/. sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE 47

someone from elsewhere, he was able to do that very wonderful. I always thought of “superfriends” as effectively. For the Singapore Biennale, the curatorial a way that Ise mapped himself onto the people team really wanted to break certain preconceptions he met. And as his superfriends, you could carry of Singapore by inviting artists to get under the social that tag with pride. It’s always an honour to be a skin so to speak, and we definitely thought that superfriend, and by giving you that name, he made Ise was one of the artists who could really do that; you feel special, that you really had something ruangrupa was another. special with him. TZH: From the label “superfriends” to his artwork I think that’s his others “secret” of connecting with title “Super Fiction” (2008), Ise had a fondness people. He brought you into his world as he engaged for the hyperbolic. In one of his interviews, he with yours. He was always very connected to his remarked that his sira pisang recipe was “super own life and place and to the people around him. simple.”19 Even his installations had cinematic He was able to expand on that in fascinating ways, titles such as Secret Affair (2011) and Operation while encompassing bigger questions about how we Bangkok (2014). For a humble artist whose works relate to one another. The way he did that with each spotlight the personal and domestic, what do you project was cumulatively clear. He took so much make of his exaggeration, his theatrical choice of joy in sharing his experiences with others. Towards vocabularies? the end, for the Langkasuka project, it was just him exploring and sharing his culture, and that’s how he RS: I think there’s this sense of wonder and magic brought his culture to the world. in the way he experienced things. “Super” is a word he used all the time, it was very much his own Sharing all these reflections can be daunting because figure of speech. He was always curious and very it’s so wrapped up in the personal as well as the interested in the cities he went to, the people he professional. We had complicated interactions, but met, which opened up other worlds for him. He was they were always good-humoured. Ise is very much able to expand something modest into something missed. That’s for sure. Russell Storer is Director of Curatorial and Collections at National Gallery Singapore, where he has co-curated exhibitions including Minimalism: Space. Light. Object.; Between Worlds: Raden Saleh & Juan Luna; Yayoi Kusama: Life is the Heart of a Rainbow, and A Fact Has No Appearance, and organised Ise’s Roof Garden installation. He was previously Head of Asian and Pacific Art at Queensland Art Gallery and Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) in Brisbane, Australia, where he was on the curatorial teams for the 6th, 7th, and 8th Asia Pacific Triennials and curator of Cai Guo-Qiang: Falling Back to Earth. From 2001–2008 he was a curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. 19 QAGOMA, “APT7 / Roslisham Ismail (aka Ise) discusses ‘The Langkasuka Cookbook’ ,” QAGOMA Youtube, October 8, 2018, retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ionoC3EixxM. 48 sentAp! \\ SPECIAL ISSUE FOR ROSLISHAM ISMAIL aka ISE