SHIMURAbros: ROAD MOVIE – Road To Singapore

Date: January 19, 2013 - July 20, 2014
Venue: NUS Museum

SHIMURAbros, a sister/brother duo of Yuka (b. 1976) and Kentaro (b. 1979), are interested in the history of cinema and the deconstruction of cinema as a medium, utilizing various forms of films and incorporating sculpture and installation to create new expressions of imagery that prompt the somatic senses of the audience.

Straddling the realms between the archaeology and histories of film and the moving image, the SHIMURAbros discovered that one of the earliest films to be made in the genre of the travel film was titled Road To Singapore, a 1940 comedy flick featuring Anthony Quinn. Working with the Sherd Library of the Lee Kong Chian Gallery, the artists focus on the archaeological materials of Dr. John Miksic and produce a video-based installation using plastic crates that are used to house the archeologists’ shards. ROAD MOVIE – Road to Singapore is a film that follows the trajectory of movement recorded as a shadow of the moving subject, opening a site where contemporary audiences can (re)live the feelings of the archaeological object and the people related in its history.

ROAD MOVIE was originally presented as part of OMNILOGUE: Your Voice is Mine, an exhibition which featured six contemporary Japanese artists working with themes related to Singapore. It was co-organised by The Japan Foundation and NUS Museum from 19 January – 21 April 2013.

[Image: Gallery Impression, SHIMURAbros Road Movie – Road To Singapore, video installation, plastic crates/size: 340x110x85cm, NUS Museum, 2013]