Alice Tay

Alecia Neo graduated from the Nanyang Technological University, School of Art, Design and Media with a major in Photography and Digital Imaging. With a great love for people and cultures, her work is often about common human experiences of alienation and loneliness, dislocation and belonging, and the search for self. Portraiture is the main focus of her work. Her latest body of work, Home Visits has received a Honorable Mention in the 2009 Berenice Abbot Prize by juror Tim B. Wride, Curator of the Department of Photographs at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Presently, she is working on a collaborative book project on Paralympics.

What motivates you to take up photography as your first degree, a course that’s decidedly different from the mainstream in a pragmatic environment like Singapore?
‘I’ve always been a visual person, learning faster and more instinctively through images and making things. When I had to decide what journey to take academically, I chose art school. The decision was made easy by the support of my parents, who believed that learning can only be hastened by interest. I decided on photography, even when I started out not able to expose properly. As naïve as it sounds today, following my gut has been the best advice I‘ve been given’.

Let’s talk about Paradise Lost, the exhibition to which you have contributed some works. Paradise Lost is about conformity, truth, fiction, and reality in life. How do your photographs reflect the theme?
‘For Paradise Lost, I contributed a few images from my series, Home Visits. Often, Singapore is closely associated with the new, malleable youth, its limitations, and horrifyingly, its monotonousness. There seems to be an uncomfortable tension within the Singaporean identity that is torn between conforming to the rapid changes in expectations of its society and holding on to its history.

‘My work reveals a side of Singapore that is familiar, yet not completely embraced in a country that is constantly renewing and upgrading itself. I photograph people in the neighborhood that I grew up in. Being one of Singapore’s oldest housing estates developed by the government’s public housing authority, Queenstown is populated with curious characters. The homes depicted in my images are often small and messy, and we are given clues about the sitters’ backgrounds through their possessions. In their homes and workplaces, they appear as they are, unpolished and charming. My camera operates as a kind of license.

‘The people I photographed have given me a great gift by allowing me to photograph them, and while photographing, I often find myself in the midst of discovery’.

What are some of challenges you face having to take photographs of people in their most private space? Any lessons you have learned in the process?
‘Photographing strangers is difficult because they have no reason to allow you that access. However, I realize that once they are agreeable, photographing people in their homes makes the session more personal and comfortable. One of the participant’s mother was finally convinced to be photographed too, after which she began sharing so much of her own stories, bringing out old photographs. I asked her why some of the people were cut out from the photos and she revealed that it was a custom to cut out people who had passed on. That is what I enjoy the most about photographing – the exchange of lives. Even though you can never get a complete picture of a person through their portrait, the camera is a very revealing tool. It often reveals the unexpected’.

In addition to your portrait and documentary work you also shoot a good deal of fashion. Is this due to commissions or mainly for fun?
‘When I first started working on a fashion portfolio, I did the work to get work. Fashion allows me to practice technique, experiment with ideas and it also helps to formulate a style, which fed into how I made my personal projects. It is also a great way to get to know people, and I enjoy seeking out models that are different and who are very aware of their bodies. Most recently, I worked with a fellow photographer, Samuel Woo, on a couple of commissioned projects that involve collaborations with hairstylists’.

Can you talk about some of the more interesting commissions you have received and what you look forward to working on in the future?
‘I got to photograph Member of Parliament, Seng Han Thong, for a Singaporean magazine feature. Mr Seng had been attacked and set on fire while on duty, and is still in the process of recovering from burns. In spite of all the controversy about the case, I found him humble and positive, in spite of his age. I’ve always found it interesting to observe a person who is undergoing some form of healing, whether physical, mental or emotional. I took a picture of him engulfed by white curtains, which I felt was very symbolic of this vulnerable period that he was going through’.

Deanna Ng is a freelance photographer specialising in documentary, portraits and off-beat travel photos. In 2006, Ng was selected as an International Participant for the Prestigious Missouri Photo Workshop by the University of Missouri. As she started photography late in her life, she believes in teaching photography to the youth. She has taught in numerous schools in Singapore and also at Objectifs: Centre for Photography and Filmmaking. Her clientele includes Ink Publishing, the Australian High Commission and the Singapore Tourism Board among others. Her photographs have also been exhibited in numerous group exhibitions in Singapore. In 2008, Ng exhibited in her first international group exhibition for The Month of Photography, Tokyo.

You didn’t start out as a full-time photographer. What inspired you to make the leap?
‘I took this workshop called “Shooting Home” at Objectifs in 2004. The workshop challenged participants to find our own story in our backyard. For the workshop, I wanted to shoot Singapore as an accidental tourist. I spent a few days trying to formulate my idea but everything was thrashed by the faculty. In the end, I went down to my neighbourhood market and shot the portraits of the hawkers. I thought if I’m a tourist, I would want to see the daily lives of the locals and nothing was more real than that.

‘Through that experience, it really opened up my mind to how photography can be used as a medium to formulate ideas and tell a story. It is a channel for expressing my ideas instead of a series of pretty pictures that don’t say anything. With that, I decided to become a photographer’.

Let’s talk about your exhibition on your travel series Phsat – Siem Reap in the Month of Photography, Japan 2008. What’s the motivation behind this series?
‘Phsat – Siem Reap was taken in 2007. It’s continuation of my market series. Siem Reap is famous for Angkor Wat but I was also interested in finding out the real life of the locals behind Angkor Wat. The Phsat was an amazing avenue into the Cambodians’ daily lives. The little details of how the girl who ties her money in a plastic money and hangs it on her shirt, the muddy grounds of the market, locals going to their dentist there and when you make a turn in the market, suddenly there was a whole section of goldsmiths – all of which I did not expect to see in a market. There was just so much life in it’.

Your latest work on Hospice patients is a departure from your travel and street photography. What is the goal of this series and what have been some of the challenges you have had to overcome?
‘I was approached by Lien Foundation last April. It was the second time they were doing this campaign. For the first project, the focus was on the hospices and the care hospices provide. When they asked me to photograph for the second project, Life Before Death Campaign, the objective was to create a legacy album for hospice patients. This legacy album would be a memory for the family members. Through this album, they also wanted to get the families talking the inevitable — death.

‘When we started this project, it was the first time we were doing it. In the album, we compiled past pictures from the patient’s collection as well as my pictures. I thought it would be difficult for the families were to see how fragile their loved ones have become. As a photographer, I questioned if I was doing the right thing, too. I was worried that the family member would be sad. But at the end of the day, we did find moments of tenderness that I thought that family members would like to keep.

‘Another challenge for me was to face death. When I first started the project, I was depressed and my earlier pictures in this project reflected that. I couldn’t imagine if I was in their position. In particular, I thought of Mr Phua who was a competitive tango dancer in his retirement years and became bed ridden. He was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease four years ago. However, I think the one lesson that these families have taught me is to count my blessings’.

Because you are a photography teacher, you see the work of many budding photographers. What qualities make an exceptional student with a promising career stand out from the rest?
‘As a teacher, I look out for their own personal input into their work. It’s hard to come up with an original idea since everything has been done to death but by shooting from the heart, the pictures come alive. I think this is what makes the pictures special and it is something hard to replicate’.