Fajrina Razak, from Singapore, was in residence at Rimbun Dahan for 6 weeks from mid February to early April 2023.
About the Artist
Fajrina Razak (b.1989) is a Singaporean visual artist, cultural worker, curator and educator.
As a visual artist, her work takes on an analysis-approach practice, using traditional materials and contemporary mediums as conduits for the archival of knowledge and by extension, forming inquiries on historical references related to Nusantara and Southeast Asia. These are entwined with an ongoing interest in issues centred around the dichotomies of ‘secularity and spirituality’ and ‘individuality and collectivity’. Working primarily with batik, her works are also translated across mediums such as image-making, installation and text-based art.
Her projects include hosting a residency programme 405 Art Residency (2020-23) and a curatorial project Between the Living and the Archive (2021). Her works are in the permanent collection of the Singapore Art Museum and private collections. She was the President of Angkatan Pelukis Aneka Daya (APAD, Association of Artists of Various Resources) in the term 2020-22.
Website: fajrina.net
About the Residency
During the residency, Fajrina divided her time between pursuing her research interest and art-making.
Fajrina’s research interests focus on (visual) culture as a motivation for understanding multitude forms of knowledge production; these formal and informal knowledge(s) are derived from archives and collections, official and unofficial histories. These interests allowed her to form inquiries on her own art-making practice with traditional mediums and review heritage textiles and cultural objects found in public and private collections.
For her art-making, Fajrina worked on a work-in-progress body creating new abstract motifs depicting flowscapes and bodily movements of spiritual practices and particularly circumambulation, an act of walking around a sacred object that involves human participation. This work is an extension of her installation work ‘after life, reverse rituals’ created in 2020. At the same time, Fajrina recreated the pucuk rebung/tumpal, a motif that has been a recurring image in her past works. The pucuk rebung and tumpal motifs, are commonly found in traditional textiles and interpreted as symbols of divinity, power and knowledge.
Below: exploring the heritage textile collection at Rimbun Dahan with Angela Hijjas.
Bottom: visit to the National Textile Museum.
Thanks to Dr Kribanandan G. N. for 2 photos featured on this page.