The publication Robert Zhao Renhui: Seeing Forest, Volume 1 of 2 accompanies Robert Zhao Renhui’s eponymous exhibition at the Singapore Pavilion at the 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, 20 April to 24 November 2024, curated by Haeju Kim and organized by Singapore Art Museum. In addition to conceptual sequences of Zhao Renhui’s images and curator Haeju Kim’s essay, this companion book gathers an assemblage of texts from various times, authors, contexts, and sources. Organized in the “Reader” section at the center of the volume, these archival pieces range from publications going as far back as 1883 to being as recent as 2020. Juxtaposing scientific and philosophical analyses with artistic interventions, storytelling, and critical reflection, the selection echoes and reverberates an interest in different ways of knowing mobilized by . Two newly commissioned essays, by environmental historian Marcus Yee and writer Jeffrey Kastner, offer in-depth meditations specifically on the artist’s practice and current intervention. As a special treat, in the concluding piece, Zhao interviews his friend and long-standing collaborator Yong Ding Li about their respective and shared experiences of working across art and ecology in Singapore.

The game has begun, Hong Kong is the prize. Britain’s surrender of Hong Kong to China has been set for 1997. But not everyone is happy. Russia, in particular, dreads the catastrophic upheavals – strategic, economic and political – that must follow. The KGB plot to ensure that China will inherit only a worthless shell, racked by social and financial instability. Pitted against them are the elite cadres of Chinese Intelligence – the Mahjong Brigade. They need an insider, and their chosen instrument is Simon Young, Hong Kong’s pre-eminent British tycoon. Simon soon finds that his unparalleled commercial skills count for little in the spy world. Who to trust? Even his beautiful Chinese wife, Jinny, has secrets to conceal... A compelling financial espionage thriller from the acclaimed author of The Man Called Kyril. Praise for The Mahjong Spies ‘Intricate, tense, rich in characters, incident, drama and intriguing details of life in its exotic locale. Trenhaile will please the most ardent fans of spyfare with this gripping story’ Publishers Weekly ‘John Trenhaile has struck gold... a gripping tale of high finance and intrigue’ Manchester Evening News

This book argues that architecture and the city and their processes can be better understood by drawing categories from disciplines that exceed the architectural and urban cultural context. It performs an open intellectual reading that traverses architecture and architectural theory, but also art theory and history, cartography, philosophy, literature and cultural studies, to unfold a series of ‘figures’ that are ambiguously placed between the representation and the construction of space in architecture and the city. The paradigm and philosophy, the island and the city, the map and representation, the model and making and the questioning of form performed by dust, are explored beyond their definition, as processes that differently make space between architecture and the city and are proposed as unorthodox analytic techniques to decipher contemporary spatial complexity. The book analyses how these ‘figures’ have been employed at different times and in different creative disciplines, beyond architecture and in relation to changing notions of space, and traces the role that they have played in the shift towards the dynamic that has taken place in contemporary theory and design research. What emerges is the idea of an ‘architecture of the city’ that is not only physical but is largely defined by the way in which its physical spaces are regulated, lived and perceived, but also imagined and projected.

A new supercomputer spells doom for Taiwan... Amid the explosion of computer technology in the 1990s, nothing comes close to Apogee – a software program able to process human speech in any language, paving the way for pilotless planes, driverless tanks and a global communications network limited only by human imagination. China, soon to resume control of Hong Kong, is now obsessed with an even greater prize in its long march to Pacific supremacy: Taiwan. The outcome is not in doubt, as long as China can secure Apogee – but there’s a problem. The software belongs to Ducannon Young Electronics in Taiwan where Mat Young, son of owner Simon, represents his autocratic father. Simon sees little beyond the limitless profits Apogee will generate, but his less hard-boiled son has become embroiled with a Taiwanese actress whose loyalties are hard to read. All sides will go to any lengths to get inside Mat’s head, convinced that his unique position must give him access to Apogee’s secrets. But Mat knows nothing, and not even the horrors of the torture chamber known to history as the Gates of Exquisite View can change that... A chilling high-stakes technothriller from ‘the heir-apparent to Le Carré’, perfect for fans of Robert Ludlum and Martin Cruz Smith. Praise for The Gates of Exquisite View ‘There is rarely a moment to pause for breath between the agonizingly suspenseful events in a thriller that is worthy of its genre’ Publishers Weekly

Intercultural dialogue is often invoked in vague reference to a method that can build cross-cultural understanding and facilitate global policy-making. This book clarifies the theoretical foundations of intercultural dialogue and demonstrates the practical significance of intercultural value inquiry, combining the perspectives of philosophy, conflict research, religious studies, and education.

This book approaches the subject of contemporary art by exploring the social embeddedness and identities of Singaporean artists. Linking artistic processes and production to both personal worlds and wider issues, the book examines how artists negotiate their relationships between self and society and between artistic freedom and social responsibility. It is based on original research into the discourses and artistic practices of local artists, with a special focus on emerging artists and artists whose work and perspectives engage with questions of identity. Reimagining contemporary Singapore and their place within it, artists are asserting their multiple and heterogeneous self-identities and contesting hegemonic norms and notions, as they negotiate and adapt to the world around them. This book is relevant to students and researchers in the fields of cultural studies, media studies, art, sociology of art, arts education, and race and ethnicity studies.