Kray Chen
HOT TEMPLE
Performance
ABOUT THE WORK
Hot Temple is the second solo exhibition by Kray Chen. This new body of work presents itself as a scene at a Teochew street opera tent in Singapore. A handful of sparsely scattered chairs are each loosely facing a fiery staging of a story from a distant past. The global pandemic adds to the narrative the loneliness, disjointedness and division of people, ideas, and behaviour. Through a new series of chair sculptures and a video opera, Chen takes the emotional temperature of a time of uncertainty, of the reflective self, of our rage and anger, and of the metred distance between each other.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Kray Chen (b.1987) is a visual artist dealing with film, performance and installations. Kray is fascinated with social rituals and behaviours. Through them, his practice contemplates the body politic and looks at the effects, remnants and traumas of ideology and biopower. He has presented at Art Encounters Biennial (2019), Singapore Biennale (2019), Bangkok Art Biennale (2018), NTU-CCA Singapore (2017), FRAC Des Pays De La Loire in France (2015), Art Stage and Singapore International Film Festival (2016). He is the recipient of the 2017 National Arts Council’s Young Artist Award. He lives and works in Singapore.