RanDian is in Singapore for Art Stage. As part of our coverage we are visiting a number of the institutions and galleries contributing to the emerging Singaporean and South East Asian art scene. In this article, we turn to Singapore’s STPI

If New York’s alter ego is Gotham City, then Singapore’s is more like a figment of J.G.Ballard’s more astringent imagination. On the surface all is sanitary order, super-modernism, and social compliance but this Fantasy Island hails from Malacca-Straits piracy and European colonialism—it is a place of mutants and hybrids where anything can be traded so long as you follow the rules. Camouflaged in a colonial building in the metropolis’s tourist center, this State of affairs has bred a mutant kunsthalle-gallery—the Singapore Tyler Print Institute.

Established in 2001 by the then Ministry of Information, Communication and the Arts, with Kenneth Tyler (b.1931) as a consultant to help settle the workshop and start the programme, the institute is overseen by a board of trustees. To its fans, it is simply STPI, one of the genuine heroines of the East Asia art scene. And yes, though blessed with super powers, it has to fight for its freedom: to maintain its sense of self. As in so many superhero stories, that often means gingerly avoiding nervous government people who don’t quite understand how special it is.

Led by its indefatigable director, Emi Eu, together with Eitaro Ogawa from the Workshop and Rita Targui from the Gallery, STPI turns 14 this year. It runs print workshops, artist residencies, talks, education programs, and exhibitions, raising a considerable portion of its running costs from sales of editions it produces in its workshop. This is the first hint of STPI’s methods. The list of artists with whom it has collaborated, who have visited Singapore as part of STPI’s residency and education programs, is a who’s who of the art world. First and foremost are the artists, including Ashley Bickerton, Do Ho Suh, Entang Wiharso, Carsten Höller, Lin Tianmiao, Qiu Zhijie, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Ryan Gander, Teresita Fernández, Tobias Rehberger, Anri Sala and Thukral & Tagra. Then there are the international museum directors, curators and even commercial galleries. It is an exceptionally influential network and it is this that makes STPI strong.

With the spotlight more recently falling on the re-launched National Art Gallery and, earlier, Singapore Art Museum, it is easy to gaze on these grand monuments and think them evidence enough of Singapore’s emerging cultural maturity or whatever other pabulum one wishes to retch for. For when counting investment of money and time, against exhibitions produced, seminars organised, connections built—people engaged!—STPI sores above these other institutions. And the reason it manages all this is that rarest of art world super powers: putting artists first.

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