A Hundred Ways To Appetite

A Hundred Ways To Appetite

In celebration of Appetite’s fifth birthday, we’ve invited artists and creatives to respond to Appetite as a concept, a space, a mood, memory or emotion….in other words, A Hundred Ways To Appetite. The title of this exhibition is itself a riff off that of an artwork commissioned to mark Appetite’s first anniversary. A Hundred Ways To Say Appetite, created in 2021 by art research collective Comp-Syn in collaboration with animation director Pedro Brehm, encapsulated 100 words that reflect the very core of Appetite’s identity and existence. Four years later, we gather once again to celebrate everything that makes Appetite unique, from our interdisciplinary approach to our constant engagement across the arts – from the culinary to the performative to the visual.

Open to public
22 August – 29 November 2025.

Irfan Hendrian
Dreaming of being a lotus
2025
Risograph and dye cut on layers of paper
56.5 x 57 x 9.2 cm

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Irfan Hendrian

“The ubiquitous shophouses of Southeast Asia echo centuries of southern Chinese migration. Singapore’s versions are often idealized: elegant grottos, their facades graced by iconic three wooden windows and open balconies, bathed in natural light and air. But in Indonesia, these same structures whisper tales of profound trauma. They stand as silent witnesses to the Dutch colonial Wijkenstelsel policy, the systematic oppression of Chinese descendants during the New Order era, and the scars of countless race riots. Many are left to decay, their neglect a premonition of future threats. Owners fortify them, covering windows and balconies with trellises, sealing all but the essential front entrance—a desperate gesture of self-preservation. Among these is a distinctive trellis pattern known locally as Seroja (Nelumbo nucifera Gaertn), named for a flower-shaped snack, though frequently mistaken for the grander lotus. The artwork features photographs that juxtapose the Appetite shophouse with other Indonesian shophouses. While sharing a similar façade format, the latter appear more barricaded and untreated.”

An artist and printmaker by profession, Irfan Hendrian (b. 1987) has consistently explored and pushed paper’s formal qualities as well as its sculptural potential. In Hendrian’s hands, paper is no longer merely a planar support for representation; it becomes both pigment and canvas, shaped into objects and installations that have grown in intricacy and scale throughout Hendrian’s artistic practice. Hendrian has participated in several group and solo exhibitions both at home and abroad, including recent solo presentations at The Arts House, Singapore (2024), Art Jakarta, Indonesia (2022), Aloft at Hermes, Singapore (2019) and Jeonbuk Museum of Art, South Korea (2016). His works are in the collection of Deutsche Bank, Germany; Jeonbuk Museum of Art, South Korea; Museum MACAN, Indonesia; Tumurun Museum, Indonesia; and Singapore Art Museum.

Khoo Guo Jie

“This series came out of a conversation with Ivan Brehm, the chef-owner of Michelin-starred restaurant Nouri and Appetite. Ivan wanted to do something together, and we spoke about his interests and approach to cooking, as well as ideas that are important to him. These spanned topics such as fermentation, cultural memory, and the work of philosopher and anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss. Capturing the alchemy of the kitchen and tracing the unseen in the spaces between feast and image, these works look for meaning in the everyday — in what we eat, how we see, and what often goes unnoticed.”

Based in Singapore and commissioned globally, photographer Khoo Guo Jie (b. 1985) explores how human experiences are interwoven with one’s environment. Through the exploration of light and colour, Khoo creates visual narratives and cinematic works. His portfolio includes projects with Monocle Magazine, Wallpaper*, Takenouchi Webb, the Embassy of Switzerland, and Patina Maldives. Most recently he was commissioned to create a site-responsive work at New Bahru, Singapore.

Liu Liling

“I am drawn to how light spills into interior spaces. While it has almost no focal point, its subtle presence is enough to be recognized, emphasizing the cavity as form and gently extending itself into the three-dimensional space around it.

An area of surprise was the windows in a corner of Appetite that opened up to a small storage space. In the same way, I wanted to further this sense of a space beyond the viewer’s immediate frame through a fine art print that seeks to remove recognizable form and space on the image plane.”

Liu Liling (b.1993, Singapore) works primarily with the photographic image to explore ideas of duration and experiential aspects of the medium, situating them within and in response to the installation site.  In her practice, she engages with various printing processes as a tool to arrive at a new picture plane, often suggesting points of departure, a coming into, and stasis. Essential to the works are visual qualities inherent to the making process, materialising as a build-up of minutiae that foregrounds the work. Liu graduated from LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore with a Bachelor’s in Fine Arts. Recent exhibitions include ‘Open Plane’, commissioned and presented by Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, Singapore; a solo presentation at Comma Space, Singapore; ’After Light’ at Mizuma Gallery, Singapore; and ‘Containment—-Field’ at The Back Room, Kuala Lumpur. In 2024, she participated in a residency with Onomichi City University, Hiroshima, Japan.

Tiffany Loy

“Colour and the subjective perception of it is a central subject in my practice. Much like taste, we experience a colour in relation to textures and layers, and its surroundings. Subtle differences and competing tones or notes (an anagram!) are an exercise for our senses and sensibilities.”

Tiffany Loy (b. 1987) is a Singaporean artist who works with fiber. Trained in industrial design in Singapore and textile-weaving in Kyoto, Loy graduated from the Royal College of Art with an MA in Textiles, specialising in weaving, and was a recipient of the DesignSingapore Scholarship. Employing a weaver’s approach to sculpture, Loy refers to her medium as the pliable line, exploring fundamental relationships between colour, structure, and tension. Minuscule details invite viewers to take a closer look and indulge in the act of observing. Loy’s works have been exhibited internationally, at venues such as Singapore Art Museum, Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art, and La Triennale di Milano. Her work is in the collection of the Singapore Art Museum.

Dawn Ng
The Earth Laughs In Flowers: Last Days of March
2025
Acrylic, watercolour, ink, dye, sand on wood
120 x 120 cm

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Dawn Ng

“To celebrate an anniversary or birthday is to mark time, and its passing. So much of my work is about an attempt to capture time and its emotional colour. I’ve worked with ice as my primary medium for 7 years now — its inherent inability to withstand this equatorial climate has always felt urgent and oddly compelling to me. Its metamorphosis, which I have often used to transform into photo portraits, films and paintings, tells a story about time and ephemerality.

2025 was a year I set out to capture in colour. I wanted to give shape to each month, through hues of things that caught my eye – images in media, films, places, food, fashion, even the sky in this city at a certain hour. I wanted to create a calendarial series of paintings, made from manoeuvring melting pigments and sand, much in the same way geological landforms come together – through heat, gravity, water, wind and earth. I wanted to give a visceral permanence to what my eyes visually devoured. In essence, I wanted to use colours to count these days. Right here, is a piece of March.”

Dawn Ng (b. 1982) is a multidisciplinary artist whose work spans a diverse range of mediums, motifs and scale. Her practice investigates concepts of time, memory, nostalgia and temporality. Ng frequently incorporates ice – the ultimate ephemeral material in the tropical climate of her native country – to articulate time’s shifts and nuances, through paintings, films, photography and performance. Often characterised by visual and emotive connections to landscape and geology, Ng’s work explores time’s transience through mark-making in a resplendence of colour, texture and detail. Ng’s work has been collected and commissioned by various institutions across Asia, Australia, and Europe; some recent presentations include the 11^th Asia Pacific Triennial (2024), Terra in France (2023), and solo presentations in Singapore and the United Kingdom.

Natalie Sasi Organ

 

“Lilac Wine and The More the Merrier are part of a series examining the mise-en-scène of restaurants: details such as wine glasses, drapery, table linen, staff uniforms, the gestures of hospitality, and so on. My images are based on studies of an iconic Michelin-starred restaurant in Bangkok called Methavalai Sorndaeng, which opened in 1957 and occupies a prime location next to the Democracy Monument. A bastion of elegance and nostalgia, it has endured over the decades, weathering the city’s vicissitudes including episodes of political turmoil. The restaurant has changed hands recently, and is in the midst of renovation under the new generation of owners. My works are testament to all the elements that make up a collective memory space for all who have visited in the past, and others who will visit in generations to come.”

 

Natalie Sasi Organ (b. 1999) examines fragmented historiographies, creating staged yet familiar scenes of composite memories and territories. Drawing from the visual language of European modernism, particularly the technique of chiaroscuro with its dramatic contrasts of light and shadow, Sasi Organ’s new works continue her exploration of a world shaped by the relics of a fading era. Forming a practice of recollection and recontextualization, Sasi Organ highlights the ephemeral and overlooked, challenging the subjective ambiguities of identity and memory. Sasi Organ has participated in numerous group exhibitions in Bangkok, Jakarta, San Francisco, London and Seoul.

Cherine Wee / A Thing of Sense
Reverie
Tin candle (80g)
Burns up to ~ 16 hours
Scent notes: clove leaf, balsam fir, pine, amber, cedarwood, juniper, moss, sandalwood

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Cherine Wee

“The elements of ‘seed’, ‘fruit’, and ‘smoke’ were my guiding thought-starters, adding on to my first impression of Appetite—as a space, and as a scent—reimagined to stir senses. Created in response to Appetite’s space, culture, and their way of honouring ingredients, the fragrance was first produced as a scent mist infused into terracotta, now taking form as a candle. A way of celebrating Appetite; a quiet ode to growth, place and season.

Like an unspoken bond shared across a table, I believe scent—ever-present and subtle, captures these fleeting moments and memories we long to hold onto, lingering with us long after they’ve passed.”

A scent artist and creative communicator, Cherine Wee (b. 1990) explores multi-dimensional and multi-disciplinary ways of presenting scent as an expressive medium, including visual imagery or text, experiments, and / or experiences. A recurring theme in her work is the concept of time, as well as a tender attention to otherwise quotidian details. Wee runs an artisanal scent studio and brand called A Thing of Sense. Apart from producing a signature line of handcrafted candles, the studio also creates bespoke scents in collaboration with local and international brands and partners, some of whom include: Supper House, Bingo, Sulwhasoo, Design Hotels, Bang & Olufsen, Basheer, and Soilboy.

For a full dossier of available works, please contact siuli@appetitesg.com

Curated by:
Tan Siuli

With thanks to:
All artists
A Thing of Sense
Ara Contemporary
Sullivan+Strumpf