Comics and annual reports may sit on opposites ends of the bookshelf, but something kind of wonderful happened when design studio Couple combined them to create George Goes to Japan, a 111-page graphic novel recounting the work of Singapore philanthropy organization Lien Foundation. The medium seemed unconventional to the studio, led by Zann Wan and Kelvin Lok—all the more appropriate for a foundation that believes in “radical philanthropy,” as a method of tackling problems on eldercare, early childhood and water sanitation with “audacious creativity” for social good.
Category: Design
Eating Together: The Design of Sharing Food in a Connected World
PHOTOS: Clarence Aw
How and what does it mean to eat together today? My partner and I present Eating Together: The Design of Sharing Food in a Connected World, an exhibition that examines the objects, systems and spaces that help us share food today.
Commissioned for the inaugural FoodCine.ma 2016, this showcase presents 15 objects, speculative designs and installations that arise out of observations of how design facilitates the ways we eat together in Singapore. Whether it is consuming forever “fresh” food, having meals at our hawker centres, dining in both life and death, or eating with digital devices, we invite visitors to look at eating beyond a mere ingestion of food, but as a consumption of values and cultures.
Now on at Objectifs – Centre for Photography and Film until 22nd May, 2016. More details on our Facebook event page.
Don’t Be Silly! Language and Design Piracy
Before its recent aspirations to become a design city, Singapore’s intellectual property system was relatively undeveloped like many developing nations, allowing piracy to thrive. Don’t be Silly! is a 4-page insert examining a 1982 legal case between two manufacturers of polypropylene chairs — the British Hille International and the local Tiong Hin Engineering — and the role of language in piracy.
This was specially created for the Singapore Art Book Fair 2016, and it builds upon the Design Piracy Institute project I launched at D-Crit as part of my MFA thesis. Risograph printers Push—Press were commissioned to print a special edition of my thesis with this insert. Limited copies are still available for sale and shipping is free worldwide.