Art Is + Noorlinah Mohamed

SP Blog’s series "Art Is +" is an attempt to view art through the eyes of artists and writers themselves. In wide-ranging interviews with vital new artists and writers from both Asia and the USA, the series ushers these voices to the forefront, contextualizing their work with the experiences, processes, and motivations that are unique to each individual artist. "Art Is +" encourages viewers and readers to appreciate art as the multitude of ways in which artists and writers continually engage with our world and the variety of spaces they occupy in it. Read our interviews with Symin Adive, Geraldine Kang, Paula Mendoza, Zining Mok, JinJin Xu, Leonard Yang, and Monique Truong.

Noorlinah Mohamed is the Artistic Director of Festival of Women N.O.W., which debuted in 2019 and is now in its third and final season. In this interview, she reflects on the interdisciplinary and diverse projects of N.O.W., and what it means to engage deeply with under-represented narratives of current moments at the intersection of art and society. Having brought together close to 200 other collaborators over these 3 years of N.O.W., Noorlinah gives us a glimpse into the celebration of alliances and solidarity between women—not only to embrace difference but to appreciate the changes that these meaningful interactions and dialogues can bring about. Festival of Women N.O.W. 2021 is presented by T:>Works and will be running as an all-digital festival from 13-30 July this year.

Visit https://www.notordinarywork.com/ for more exhibition and event information.

[Image courtesy of Jeannie Ho]

This interview with Noorlinah Mohamed is one of two that we had the pleasure of doing with two of the many amazing women behind N.O.W. 2021. Our interview with Vithya Subramaniam, creator of Thamizhachi: A Digital Museum of Tamil Women Under Construction and writer-performer of Rasanai: An Invitation to Appreciate appears next week.

“N.O.W. has to be about the less-seen or -heard narratives
and working with collaborators who see possibilities
and are invested in harnessing the best in the human spirit…”

Jade Onn: Congratulations on the 3rd season of the Not Ordinary Work (N.O.W.) festival! How did the idea for N.O.W. first come about and what were the initial stages of conceptualizing/organizing this festival like?

Noorlinah Mohamed: Inspiration and ideas are seeded long before they manifest, or if we retain the planting analogy, long before they bloom. I was inspired by the women artists I got a chance to work with when I was the Director of The O.P.E.N. - a three-week pre-festival of ideas mounted during the Singapore International Festival of Arts from 2014-2017. The women artists—Zanele Muholi (South African artist), Newsha Tavakolian (Iranian photojournalist) and Manuela Infante (Chilean director)—whom I worked with affected me not just by their artistry but also their connection to society. I didn’t know it then but they would later become beacons or perhaps ambers for what I would eventually create with N.O.W. See, even the name N.O.W. is a tribute to The O.P.E.N.

So in 2018, when I was asked to create something for T:>Works, I very quickly came up with this idea. The title, of course, came much later. The idea of a gathering of women, not only from the arts and culture world, but also from other sectors, was a means for me to bridge art and life as well as reflect my interests not only in the arts and culture but also sociology, anthropology, and politics.

JO: How did you go about choosing and bringing together these amazing groups of collaborators, not once but 3 times?

NM: I like to learn. I am curious by nature. And from the start I knew I wanted to collaborate with women from different sectors, and women whom I am fascinated by, with projects and interests that are diverse and are not common. What makes them who they are? I am fascinated by their ideas, their intention, and their pursuits. I start with a lead, and then I do my research (read, talk, visit, watch, listen), I organise meet-ups, I talk to people, and then I invite them to come on board. It is about bringing people and their ideas together. I sometimes feel like I’m a sorcerer, conjuring up dreams and visions. Sometimes I am very much like a farmer, tending the ground. And then there are times I am the enforcer, driving the projects forward. I play all roles, motivated very much by the energies and passions the collaborators bring to their projects.

Not Ordinary Work 2019 Digital Poster. Courtesy of N.O.W. 2019.

JO: This festival was originally designed for a three-year season. What was the significance of starting N.O.W. in 2019 with that (a three-year season) already in mind and how has that affected your process of organizing N.O.W. over the past 3 years? 

NM: I like to do things in a 3-year cycle. Why 3? I don’t know. Maybe, I think it is just the right amount of time and energy to spend on an idea, I suppose. To be honest, with N.O.W. I can go on for another three more years. But is there a need to do so? For what I needed to do with N.O.W., the ideas that I wish to investigate, think about, deep dive into, 3 years is about right. Because I set myself this limit, I am very focused on the ideas I want to investigate.

N.O.W. has to be about the less-seen or -heard narratives and working with collaborators who see possibilities and are invested in harnessing the best in the human spirit, or who desire to venture into the less familiar territories. I had a preliminary map of what I wanted to do for each iteration, but I remind myself not to hold on to these ideas too tightly. There must be room for change because the collaborators will bring their own ideas, their own perspectives, and that will colour the shape, flow, and direction of each N.O.W.

Also, since I only have 3 years, I really work hard at it, push myself a lot, and then drive everyone mad (laughs). I am supremely relentless.

JO: This year, N.O.W. is going to be an all-digital festival but last year’s festival also included events and workshops that were available online. What are some of the pros and cons of organizing a (partially or completely) digital festival, as compared to an in-person one? Given the choice and safety to organize in-person festivals again, would you choose to continue holding events online?

NM: I love the digital. I love experimenting with it. But creation is a two-way process. You create in-conversation with an imagined other (an audience, reader, listener). So while I love doing things digitally, I am also aware that not everything can be done digitally and not everyone likes it. The face-to-face interaction is still important and there is a craving for it, especially after a long spell of distancing and separation. N.O.W. 2020 was designed as a hybrid event—the live events had a digital component. And I wish to continue experimenting with that. Hybridity allows us to reach out to a global audience more easily. But hybridity also requires that all of us—performers, directors, producers, production and technical teams—all need to be digitally savvy. An actor needs to be able to perform, handle technology as well as technically manage their devices. You are both a creative as well as a resource manager. You suddenly need to expand your skills. I am more tech savvy now than I ever was a year ago.

Not Ordinary Work 2020 Digital Poster. Courtesy of N.O.W. 2020.

JO: I love this question you posed in your introduction to N.O.W.: “How do we chart a journey together, with intention and commitment for deep engagement that surmounts the technological mediation?” What does “deep engagement” mean to you at the moment? Is there a difference between the engagement that is achievable via technology and the engagement that is achievable in person?

NM: Deep engagement is about multiplicity. It is like a conversation highway with perspectives flowing to and from different entry points and criss-crossing at intersections. We meet, we talk about it, we listen, we disagree or agree, we experience, and then we part ways. The highway is the platform, and needs to be an open and smooth flowing one. I aim for N.O.W. to be such a highway and with each iteration I curate with one or two themes in mind, and I see each event offering different perspectives on the themes. Previously as a ‘live’ event, we can literally witness these conversations happening. The pre- and post-event gatherings in the foyer; the dialogue sessions held a day to two after the openings, the happenstance corridor conversations that pop up when you least expect it. These occurrences are not impossible in the digital setting, just different. As someone who is organising this, I have to create different opportunities for such gatherings to take place. It may be post-show dialogues within Zoom, utilising the respective chat functions with behind-the-scenes moderator engaging with the online viewers; creating interactions within the online platforms, or even pre-festival digital events to encourage conversations before the festival begins. This year, the collaborators and I have created three online digital exhibitions to generate pre-festival conversations on the themes of N.O.W. 2021.

Let me give you an example. Rasanai: An Invitation to Appreciate is an one-night only livestreamed performance twinned with a 2-month long digital exhibition of Thamizhachi: A digital museum of Tamil Women Under Construction that began on 10 June. The exhibition has an open call inviting on-going conversations with the public that are later animated in Rasanai.

Meanwhile, co-creators Sim Yan Ying “YY” and Nabilah Said has created (un)becoming, a livestreamed devised performance piece, with an Instagram exhibition of stories, called @unbecoming stories on IG, featuring narratives gathered from the public on mother-daughter relationships. These public narratives are uploaded about one-month prior to the performance, and some of them are weaved into the devised performance itself.

The idea of multiplicity is embedded not only in these projects but also the other projects we commissioned for N.O.W. 2021.

The entire curation ethos takes on this idea of multiplicity, and the juxtaposition of each event in conversation with another is a means by which we create channels for engagement. Of course there is always the post-show dialogue, but we don’t always have to talk about things. Sometimes, we need to give people space and time for engagement to develop for themselves. 

“There must be room for change
because the collaborators will bring their own ideas,
their own perspectives,
and that will colour the shape, flow, and direction of each N.O.W.”

JO: What advice would you give other budding artist-activists who hope to/are also working to build spaces for deep engagement, online and off? What would you say to those who are still hesitant to engage with these spaces that you, the collaborators of N.O.W., and other creators seeking to ask the uncomfortable questions are building?       

NM: Why do we hesitate? Is it fear? Is it our judgement of the digital? Do we lack the resources and capacity to work with it? Or because we are not interested in it? I’d say, find out why. At the end of the day it really boils down to an attitude towards creation and what it means to you. I am one of those fools who love a good challenge. At the start of the pandemic, most were lamenting the loss of liveness and intimacy, and that the digital is a poor replacement. In March 2020, I embraced the need to move into the digital landscape because the alternative of not having any creation was the less desirable option. I perceived the digital then, and still now, not as a replacement for live performance. It can never be a replacement. I saw the digital experience as a parallel journey to research, investigate, and discover. It is a whole new universe for me. It is a new frontier. I am fascinated by it and learning a lot about it. I didn’t know then, and still am not sure now, if it can be sustained when life gets better a year or two from now. But with all artistic endeavours, there is always an element of the unknown. Will it succeed? Is this a good direction? Is it new to me? Am I interested in it? What am I learning from this experience? Or is this too familiar? Why am I doing it? Artists take leaps of faiths all the time. But we also assess if these leaps are ‘worth taking’. The measure of that worth varies and that deserves reflection.

JO: What does the future of N.O.W., and all the values, hopes and womanly determination that it represents, look like to you as we approach the final season of this festival? 

NM: N.O.W. as a three-year festival may come to an end for me, personally, but the work itself never ends. These resilient and determined collaborators will still continue their work. N.O.W. is only a pit-stop in their respective journeys. Perhaps I hope N.O.W. will be remembered as that pit-stop that they benefitted from and had fruitful processes with. And that everyone gained from their engagement with N.O.W., whatever that gain is.

Personally, I am glad I got a chance to work with close to 200 collaborators; and I have never worked with most of them before. I learnt a great deal from them. I continue to follow their work and with some I have engaged in conversations on future collaborations. I am mindful these platforms, like N.O.W., are nothing more than just platforms. What we do within it, the relationships we build, the mistakes we make and try to learn from, the triumphs shared, the day-to-day challenges—all these moments need time and space to process and reflect upon. N.O.W. has legs; it doesn’t need to be in the shape and form that I’ve done it. It can morph and change. A different artistic director with a different perspective can take N.O.W. elsewhere. I hope someone would.

Not Ordinary Work 2021 Digital Poster. Courtesy of N.O.W. 2021.

A recent implant from Singapore via New York, Jade Onn is currently pursuing her MA/PhD in English Literature at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in an attempt to further articulate the circulation and rhetorics of Singaporean anglophone literatures. In her free time, she indulges in plant propagation and nostalgia.