Amalgamate Anthem

The Amalgamate Anthem (Sculpture: AEP)

This was an artist-run workshop with Singaporean sculptor, Zainudin Samsuri. 

In early 2002, 15 Sec 3 (Year 10) students were selected to participate in the Sculpture enrichment workshop. After being exposed to the surrealist imagery, the pupils were taught how to investigate their sub-conscious mind and breathe their newly explored imagery into interesting drawings. The pupils were taught the techniques of aerated concrete carving. The carved images reflected much of the pupils’ diverse personalities. Interesting images ranged from the Ketupat to just plain playful cats.

The installation ‘The Amalgamate Anthem’ birthed as the result of these pupils’ hard work and pure sincerity. It is also a celebrated fusion of different nationalities, races and talents in this increasingly globalised world.

‘The Amalgamate Anthem’ addresses the realisation of emerging raw artistic talents across neighbourhood schools. Up close, you can sense the tremendous appetite of these pupils who have never been to the art museum or experienced real contemporary art in any manner, attacked these concrete blocks with vigour and passion. Their lives can never be the same, their senses have come alive.

Much of their work explore and extend on the theme of humanity and with the different diversities, they form a metaphoric mindscape that can be reviewed as a story, a mystery, a riddle, a vision, an understanding, a nightmare, a reflection, a form of violence, subversion, philosophy, memory and even theatre. ‘The Amalgamate Anthem’ shapes itself as an awakening vibration to those who are still asleep.