An interview with artist Donna Ong

Donna Ong is better known for her sculpture installations utilising furniture, found objects and drawing. However, in 2004 she won the Sefton Open Competition in 2D Art, UK. This was the first time in the history of the competition that a photographic image was awarded first prize. The winning entry described by the English Daily Post Newspaper included the words, “morbid” and “haunting”.

Resident in England for the past nine years, Donna has two degrees – one in architecture from University College London (UCL), and the other in fine art from Goldsmiths College. She has won several awards and scholarships for her work during her education – the two most prestigious being the Singapore Undergraduate Scholarship from UCL and the Shell-NAC scholarship from the Singapore Arts Council and Shell. Her work has been exhibited both in England as well as in Singapore.



RJ says:
Hello Donna.

Donna says:
Hi Raj.

RJ says:
To get quickly started, tell us a little about your Singapore Biennale 2006 project.

Donna says:
It's a sculpture installation, involving secret "projects" in four different rooms.

Donna says:
What you will see when you enter the room, is a piece of furniture that has been manipulated to fulfill the secret desires of the persona "living" in that same room. One persona might be a Judge obsessed with ice caves or a barren woman longing for a child.

RJ says:
Wonderful Donna.

RJ says:
Are you pretty much done or still in discussions with your curator(s)?

Donna says:
I'm still in discussion about the actual venue of the works, but I was given the go-ahead to start working diligently.

Donna says:
There's a lot to do!

RJ says:
I am sure. So how does it work in these Biennale type exhibitions? Do you get a lot of support? Have you got the budget to get some help to set up your works? Can you get a team together to help you with the little things?

Donna says:
Well Fumio is the main curator. He has chosen a team of three other curators who work closely together. They are supported both by NAC as well as outside sponsorship. The artists chosen by this team are given both an artist fee as well as material fee for the project proposed. The budget is thus dependent on how elaborate your work is, as well as whether this is a new or existing work.

Donna says:
And yes, I can get a team together to help me with my work, but I've only got a fixed material fee, so the money to pay them would have to come out of that.

RJ says:
I see.

RJ says:
"Deriving from her vivid imagination, Donna Ong creates curious objects and contraptions which bewilder yet intrigue. Using everyday as well as found objects, her installations allude to narratives which in turn give rise to questions about the intentions, imagination and fantasy that underlies their existence."

RJ says:
The above is a little write up about your art at SB2006. You are concerned with intentions, imagination and fantasy of objects that you use in your sculptures. Can you give an example Donna?

Donna says:
Hehe. The write-up sounds better than my personal bio.

Donna says:
Anyways, about my work... I am interested in the stories objects tell. Especially used objects, they hold within themselves a hidden narrative that one senses even though it may not be revealed. Other objects such as dolls, wings, etc contain symbolism and uncanny associations derived from their usage within cultural and literary history. I mean all objects have meanings.

Donna says:
I use these inherent meanings, putting them together, in the way dreams happen (i.e. when disparate objects are juxtaposed in an unexpected manner), to form narratives that are a platform from which the viewer can construct their own fantasies.

RJ says:
How will you best advice someone visiting your exhibit at the Biennale to get the most out of your exhibit? A lot of people walk quickly past installations and sculptures not knowing what to make of them.

Donna says:
My advice is to just give it time. Spend time with it and explore it. Enter the work, be quiet, and let the work tell you what it is, not what you think it is. I like to reward the curious viewer. So the viewer who walks past quickly sees a weird piece of furniture. However, the one who has the audacity and patience to explore further, might discover shimmering glass caves under the desk, or, boxes with detailed sketches of deformed foetuses within the drawers. They will find that what appear to be medical equipment and tubes are actually straws and other everyday objects. I believe every artwork should contain a surprise for the diligent viewer.

RJ says:
Brilliant!!

RJ says:
I look forward to it.

RJ says:
And yes, talking about detail drawings of foetuses, I have seen your series of drawings, "Awaken not the slumbering drawing" from some 5 years ago.


RJ says:
Can you tell us a little about these drawings?

Donna says:
The drawings were from an exhibition called "Palace of Dreams". They were A1 sized, meticulously drawn insect wings (minus the bodies) using technical pen. I wanted them to be really simple. Just beautiful, as perfect as possible and straightforward - just the way we would imagine wings would look like in our dreams.

Donna says:
These drawings were about dreams. Wings are a symbol of flight, of a desire to fulfill a dream. I used technical pen to heighten the symbolism, the inherent meaning in the image. Technical pens are used by architects in plans of buildings that they wish to see built, but are at that moment, unfulfilled. Thus the images of the wings stand as symbols of unfulfilled dreams and the act of drawing represents the desire to see them fulfilled.

RJ says:
I love your wings. Also, I was discussing your drawings with another artist the other day and we were fascinated by them. I sense somehow that you are interested in the forms and colors and two-dimensional visuals of anatomies. Of insects, animals and perhaps humans. Am I wrong?

Donna says:
Thanks!

Donna says:
And yes you are right. I love the forms of nature. I came to art the traditional way, sketching nature and for years, attending life drawing sessions. This is still a big part of my aesthetics, and I find that even now, there are few things that can compare with the expressive random complexity of natural forms. However, I am also very interested in the idea of mimicry, trying as a human to imitate nature. Like science trying to achieve the same effects as what happens naturally in nature, but through electronic or other manmade means. Thus all my works though religiously observed and drawn, still retain a very artificial, scientific quality in the way it has been drawn with technical pen.

RJ says:
To pull things together, how do sketches of foetuses, hidden ice caves and medical instruments tie in with the overall theme of the Biennale belief?

Donna says:
Yes, it does all sound rather random. Well all these objects tell narratives of the "people" to whom they belong to. Of course these people are made-up imagined characters. But each of the four characters is an individual and has a secret desire or obsession, a belief in something specific, that is only expressed and revealed in the private realm, i.e. their room.

Donna says:
In order to play out their fantasies and attempt to materialise their dream, each character using whatever materials and skills he or she has, manipulates their environment through addition and transformation to close the gap between desire and reality.

Donna says:
You could say, I am interested in the idea of faith. In showing materially an unseen faith. I am interested in people who believe in things that other people would find it hard to believe in. An obsessive, passionate kind of belief that is often manifested only in private.

Donna says:
I want to know why, how? I want to understand that kind of belief, and thus I mimic these people, hoping in my imitation of their behaviour, to feel a little of what they feel.

Donna says:
I want to know what makes them stick. What makes them hold on to something. What gives them hope to go on.

RJ says:
Marvelous.

RJ says:
These private beliefs, these hidden faiths-such a contrast to our more overt, in-your-face ideas of reality - a sum of our beliefs. How do these private beliefs shape a person's realities?

Donna says:
Everyone has a public and private self. The public self is what everyone sees, but I'm interested in the private self, that vulnerable being that harbours secret wishes that are often unfulfilled, who gets hurt, who waits and hopes. I believe people's public actions are all governed by our private beliefs, which are in turn are built upon quiet hidden narratives. I am interested in investigating and manifesting these narratives.

RJ says:
Ahh..

Donna says:
Of course I'm just an amateur enthusiast on this topic, my work is an investigation, an exploration into this subject.

RJ says:
Final few questions and I will be done Donna.

RJ says:
Tell us a little about your sojourn in Goldsmiths in UK. What was it like? How was doing art different from what you learnt at UCL?

Donna says:
Ah, very very different. I studied architecture in UCL and fine art at Goldsmiths. At UCL, projects though conceptual, were not really personally motivated, and driven. Themes and direction were set by the tutor of your study group and you were encouraged to work within those given boundaries. At Goldsmiths, projects were personally motivated. Artworks came from things we were struggling with or were interested in. That sometimes made it tough because if you had no ideas, you had no one to blame it on, and might beat yourself up for being boring. This also made it hard to hear criticism about your work because especially in my first year, it felt as if I were being attacked on a personal level.

RJ says:
Wonderful. I see. It will be awesome to hear you talk about the winning photograph at Sefton Open Competition in 2D Art, UK. You have probably been asked to comment a million times on it!

Donna says:
Well, it was quite long ago but it was the piece that really sparked off my direction in art. It's a series of 24 black and white stills (i.e. photographs) that show an interior of a room. From the objects in the room, one can piece together a story of the owner of the room. As we look at the images, we realise something strange is going on. There are anatomy studies, models of hands, foetuses in glass jars, drawings of insects...

Donna says:
Eventually we see the fruits of the character's labours... little creatures - half human, half insects, in bottles, under the microscope and in photographs. As you can see, most of my themes and aesthetics stem from this piece.

RJ says:
Wonderful Donna and thanks. Final question. What influence do you think 'street art' is exerting on the scape of visual arts today? How does it matter if at all? How will paintings and art appreciation change?

Donna says:
"Street art" has been around for quite some time inart, however it has just been rather quiet in Singapore, probably because of the government's hard stance on vandalism. However, its values of bringing art from the galleries into everyday life, to the people, as well as its desire to make art that is reflective of culture and everyday, have been taken up by visual artists today. More and more artists are realising a "tao", "high versus low art" attitude is just not helping to increase the art audience. I think visual artists are attempting to make a change, to explain their works as well as to make more accessible works. There seems to be a return to skill-based art, art that can be seen to be more labour-intensive, and involving a certain level of skill and aesthetic. This type of art obviously is more accessible to a wider range of people.

RJ says:
Brilliant and thanks again Donna.

RJ says:
It has been instructive.

Donna says:
Thanks for interviewing me and for this opportunity.