Because it has the Government’s ear now, dare anyone say that the visual arts industry has arrived? Gallery owner, Mohammad Nazli Aziz and the Director of Lifestyle Section, MATRADE, Abu Bakar Yusof tell of ventures overseas to market our ‘cultural assets’. They also tell of other steps necessary to ensure a sustainable, creative ecosystem for this industry.

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To celebrate Halloween and to engender the mood, we create just for you our version of Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Raven’.

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When artists are asked to take selfies what do they reveal about themselves through their choices? Some 20 artists were invited to turn the camera on themselves, take self-portraits and through these pictures inquire our ‘social, political, geographical and technological state.’

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The percussionist is on his annual visit to the country bringing his African rhythms to music lovers and other musicians at his favorite venue. Taking a break from his schedule--the rehearsals and soundcheck--Mokhtar Samba the percussionist drops by the studio to tell about documenting African rhythms, launching of his latest CD and being a senior musician.

Listen to our previous interview with Mokhtar Samba here: An African Jazz Project

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When asked about what his art means or what he wants to communicate through it, the artist Cheong Laitong often responds, “It’s up to you to catch it.” We’re catching him instead and sitting him down in our studio to point us in the direction of where his art has come and where it is going so that we can catch it on our own.

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An artist residency with an exhibition “inspired by the belief that individuals live with the problem [free will] and so of choice; and balancing between two or more parallel realities - physical, ideological, emotional and illusionary. Expectations may not be met due to the asymmetry of information while objectivity is almost never achieved in our decision making process.”

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Supported by an industry of writers and illustrators of children’s books, Big Wooden Horse has another production in KL titled ‘The Way Back Home’. The last time the company was in town, it played ‘Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus’. What’s the scariest thing about performing for pre-school children? What is the worst that could happen? We’ll hear what the actors have to say.

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Three from Sirius Quartet tell about being musicians who teach and at the same time play professionally, compose and record music. But how do professional musicians continue to learn? They reveal how being in a group, they get to learn from each other. Sirius Quartet is in the country teaching masterclasses, but they will also perform. The musicians take the occasion to explain the quartet’s sound, kind of music it produces and the experience it tries to impart.

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Documenting other women through photography becomes the vehicle for the photographer to explore issues of identity, beginning with herself. She tells of her displacement from Malaysia, to the United States and eventually settling in France and how this modern nomadic life precipitates questions of Who am I? What are my roots? Do they matter? Armed with a clunky 19th-century viewfinder camera she dialogues with her subjects to both learn about them and collect pieces of her fragmented self. She reveals, “When I left Malaysia at 14 all the pieces of me just exploded.”

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This dance tradition from the Dominican Republic has evolved and is now practiced and celebrated all over the world. And being in the world, this international dance fuses the traditional with the contemporary, originating in new steps and moves. Our guests detail the dance tradition and show how bachata is related to Salsa, Merengue, Zouk and Kizomba.

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