by Zahirah Suhaimi

In light of recent arrests under the name of ISA (Internal Security Act), the launch of Singaporean publication, Our Thoughts Are Free, could not have come at a more apt, or darker, time. The book is a collection of poems and prose written by victims who have suffered under the draconian enforcement of the Singapore Internal Security Department and/ or forced to live in exile, dragged and casted away from the country they lived for, fought for, faced internment for and willing to die for.

by Zahirah Suhaimi

The Central Market area in Kuala Lumpur has always been bustling with local shoppers, artisans and curious tourists. Last weekend, this creative hotspot was especially crowded with the KL Alternative Book Festival and Art for Grabs happening at the Annexe Gallery.

by Lydia Chai

There is a famous moment in Laurence Sterne’s eighteenth century novel, The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, when the character Yorick dies and we the readers are then confronted with an entire black page.

This odd literary device might elicit laughter and amusement because of its simplistic representation of death, darkness, and fear of nothingness.

We might also think it poignant that the story’s long-winded narrator, Tristram, finds himself at a sudden loss for words and can only express his grief with a silent, dark page.

by Joe Kidd

There was a time when a lot of the works (musical, lyrical and beyond) by “punks” were pretty much informed, influenced or even “rehashed” from literature or the ideas presented by books, poems, architecture, art movements etc

by ARTERI

It is not uncommon for me to be stumped whenever I am asked for a reading list on contemporary art in Southeast Asia. So much of what I know is acquired through fieldwork, contacts, long hours spent talking to artists, curators, historians, critics. So little of this knowledge (gossips, legends, histories, theories) has yet to be documented and written down, analysed and most importantly shared.