Name: Woo Fook Wah
Year: 2014
Thesis Title: “I Paint What I See.” Looking at the Art of Wee Shoo Leong from a Nanyang Perspective and Beyond
Thesis Abstract
This thesis analyses the art of Wee Shoo Leong produced between 1990 and 2011. It focuses on his still life paintings and traces the evolution of his art as works that mirror the Nanyang style and its development beyond this genre. These developments have both philosophical and technical foundations. This research highlights the influence of his education in the Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, and examines the influence of Nanyang style artists on the technical and philosophical development of the artist. However, Wee has departed from his early influences an outcome of his constant experiments with technical and conceptual approaches to art.

Name: Vedrenne Mol Marie-Pierre
Year: 2014
Thesis Title: Contemporary Women Artists in Myanmar Issues in Gender, Motherhood and Nation in the Work of Phyu Mon, Chaw Ei Thein, ma Ei and Nge lay
Thesis Abstract
Myanmar’s opening to the outside world represents an opportunity to better assess the evolution of her contemporary art since the mid-1990s and how women have contributed to it. This thesis focuses on a group of women artists who have in common to place gender issues at the center of their practice and artworks to address social and political issues. Myanmar women artists have used art to address social and political issues, and to create a space for themselves. Contemporary forms of expression, such as performance art, installations and photography were fast adopted by women artists since the mid 1990s. Inspired by some international vanguard practices, Myanmar women artists have chosen to use a visual vocabulary deeply anchored in local tradition and cultureThe objective of this thesis is to investigate the conceptual and visual strategy of these artists. Based on the intersection of personal and national history, on collaborative approaches with the community and on the slippage between genres, this strategy is used to address three recurring themes: the traditional role of women in the household, motherhood and lack of freedom. Although the artworks created by these women artists were not inspired by a feminist agenda, the leitmotif of their themes justifies considering them as a group.

Name: Francis Choo
Year: 2014
Thesis Title: Social Realism in Singaporean Art: Its Beginnings, Practice and Subsequent Decline
Thesis Abstract
This thesis discusses the social, political, economic and cultural that influenced the emergence and subsequent decline of social realist art in Singapore. Although social realist art originated from Europe, Chinese immigrant artists and those who were Chinese educated dominated its practice in Singapore. The influence of Communist ideology from China as well as racial communalism was also associated with the rise of social realist art in Singapore.Artists such as Koeh Sia Yong, Lee Boon Wan, Ong Tian Soo and Chua Mia Tee were pioneer social realist artists of Singapore. They organised art societies that drove the social realist art movement which was active in the 1950s and early 1960s. However the conditions for the rise and fall of this form of art were dependent on the political motivations of ruling parties. The art form reached its peak in the 1950s but declined in the 1960s due to certain political actions.

Name: Derelyn Chua
Year: 2014
Thesis Title: The Contributions of Post-Independence Singapore Malay Artists: Some Problems and Issues
Thesis Abstract
This thesis attempts to locate the contributions of the post-independence Malay artists, to put forward an alternative history to the better-known Singapore Story. The approach involves a consideration of the importance of art as a form of Malay cultural heritage to the Malay community and the wider Singapore society, to underscore the motivations underlying the Singapore Story that had submerged the voices of the Malay artists’. Also, it has taken into account other contributory factors that have caused the Malay artists to be marginalised, such as the lack of consistent patronage; the Malay community’s concept of art as opposed to understanding of art which is entrenched in Western discourses; and the artists’ mediums of expressions that are not conventionally regarded as fine art. This thesis seeks to make a contribution to the historiography of Singapore art, and to the ongoing debates about Singapore’s past.