Stepping Into the Modern – Impressionism at National Gallery Singapore

National Gallery Singapore was conceptualised in the early years of this century, officially opened in 2015 and became another grand building I did not step into. This one is a grand old building, more accurately, two grand old buildings (built in the late 1920s) – the old Supreme Court and City Hall – now functioning as one.

It was the Impressionists who brought me here!

With extremely poor knowledge and conventional preferences in art, this is no surprise, I suppose. I do like the Impressionist style for its pretty, float-y feel, and I like knowing what I’m looking at. For example, if it’s a tree, I need to know it is a tree, and if it’s the sea, I need to know that’s what it is. This exhibition is just right for me!

Visit to a Museum, Degas, 1880

Enter...

People were enjoying

Renoir

Pissarro, Monet, Renoir

Monet

more Monet, and probably the seats as well

and some hands-on work

Among the pieces I liked were these floral/still life ones, whose artists I must admit I had not heard of before.

Narcisse Virgile Diaz de la Pena

Henri Fantin-Latour

Berth Morisot

I won't put all the pictures I took here but from the indoors to the outdoors, they were all gorgeous paintings.

Pissarro

Cezanne

Sisley

Jongkid (Dutch artist)

Boudin

Corot

I bet in most people's minds, Impressionism mostly looks something like this:

Monet

Renoir

Can't blame us!

Into the Modern

Impressionism from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston,
with your whopping 100 over beautiful paintings,

thank you for coming here!

Into the Modern is on till 1 March 2026

Go, get your tickets!

Comments

True train school

‘Having eyes, but not seeing beauty; having ears, but not hearing music; having minds, but not perceiving truth; having hearts that are never moved and therefore never set on fire. These are the things to fear, said the headmaster.’ How would you like to have such a headmaster? I finally re-read (read it first as a teenager) Totto-chan, The Little Girl at the Window , a ‘school story’ by Tetsuko Kuroyanagi, translated by Dorothy Britton. Totto-chan is the name Tesuko Kuroyanagi called herself, and the book is about her life during her school days at Tomoe Gakuen. Totto-chan was expelled from her first elementary school because of her ‘disruptive’ behaviour, which included constantly opening and closing her desk top (because she was so thrilled by it), ‘vandalising’ her desk (because there wasn’t enough space on the piece of paper to draw) and standing by the classroom window waiting for street musicians to pass by or talking to swallows. Her mother, although probably alarmed about the ...

The Secret Romantic Guesthouse (2023)

The title has an airy, genial feel and the show does have its airy, genial side, but I also think of it as TRAPPED, since everyone was trapped by the past. It was fun trying to figure out who was who, who was on whose side and how the awful king would fall. The scholars It wasn’t too hard to guess that Kang San (Ryeo Un) is the deposed/missing prince and that he isn’t really gruff and disinterested although he’s exasperated and rolling his eyes most of the time. Shi-yeol (Kang Hoon) has the best ‘disguise’, with the nice contrast between his highly-skilled fighting and loyalty versus his silliness. It felt at times that Yoo-ha (Jung Gun-joo) was an extra but finally, he gets that one brave act of letting himself be captured to protect the rest. Shi-yeol identifying himself to Kang San as his watchman was dramatic but the most shocking revelation in the show was that the Old Guy (Shi-yeol’s mentor) is the king’s watchman! Ho...

No wonder

According to a poll of about 300 people, reported in yesterday's Sunday Times, (how come nobody ever asks me these things?) , the Seven Wonders of Singapore are (in order of merit): 1. The Esplanade (a whopping 82 votes) 2. Changi Airport (53 votes) 3. Sentosa 4. The Merlion 5. The Singapore River 6. Food 7. Mount Faber and LKY (tie - 10 votes each) Some 'offbeat choices' which didn't make it to the top 7: aunties selling tissue paper at coffee shops, Singlish, kiasuism, 4D-Toto outlets and Newater (said someone of Newater: 'We are probably the only country with branded recycled sewage.' Well said, ha ha.). Maybe it's a personal bias but I feel that a 'Wonder' must also have strong historical and cultural/social value (so I'm rather miffed that Angkor Wat didn't make it to the 7 Wonders of the World; in fact it was never in the running for the top 7). Therefore, these choices are a little too modern for me. The Esplanade, for example, is a...

my ajumma notes

Search This Blog