Singapore Biennale 2025 Explores Contradictions of Intention Through Dispersed Public Artworks

The 8th Singapore Biennale, titled 'pure intention', runs through 29 March 2026 at Singapore Art Museum and various city venues. Curated by Duncan Bass, Hsu Fang-Tze, Ong Puay Khim, and Selene Yap from SAM, the exhibition features over 80 artists questioning whether artistic intention reinforces power or reveals bias. Gala Porras-Kim's work 'Our identity is determined by our productivity' (2025) places poetic picnic blankets in Burmese shops at Peninsula Plaza, targeting migrant worker communities who gather Sundays near City Hall and Fort Canning Park. Tanatchai Bandasak's '/s/' (2025) relocates a marine bollard from Pasir Panjang container terminal into the museum, creating ambiguity about functional objects as art. Rirkrit Tiravanija's 'Untitled 2016 (form follows function or vice versa no. two)' (2016) at Far East Shopping Centre offers T-shirts with 'Freedom Cannot Be Simulated' slogans, while Tan Pin Pin's video diptych 'On a Clear Day You Can See Forever' (2025) at Lucky Plaza juxtaposes archival polar bear footage with expressway views. The Sri Lankan collective The Packet presents 'Water Under the Bridge/A Bridge Under Water' (2025), recreating a mid-2000s internet café with contributions from 12 artists including Sohrab Hura and Tabita Rezaire. The biennial deliberately blurs boundaries between art and reality, leaving visitors uncertain whether displacing objects liberates or domesticates meaning.