In this double bill of performance and live art, two Singaporean artists now living in Australia reflect on their roots, how far they’ve travelled from them and how much they still identify with where they came from – with interesting contrasts and parallels.
In Saltwater, Jamie Lewis invites us to sit down at a large, round dining table and help her remove the “ugly bits”, the tops and tails, of bean shoots. The audience members, around 15 of us, get to work, while Lewis shares stories of her life – touching on her childhood memories, the lessons her mother taught her, the meaningful meals in her repertoire, and Australian customs she had to get used to, even within her marriage to an Aussie bloke. Lewis cooks up the bean shoots we’ve prepared and instructs us to please set the table. Then, dinner is served: the stir-fried bean shoots, Devil’s Curry (a staple Eurasian dish and one of Lewis’ favourites), and steamed rice with cucumber and homemade sambal (there’s extra for us to take home afterwards!). Lewis – who is a generous, down-to-earth, funny and captivating speaker – continues to chat with us while we dig in, occasionally asking questions too, so that it evolves into a conversation. The whole experience of preparing and sharing a meal with strangers who are all genuinely having a good time and sharing pieces of themselves is incredibly heartwarming and comforting. It’s a simple, lovely concept that seems to leave everyone feeing fuller in more ways than one.
Joe Lui’s Letters Home focuses on why he left Singapore, never to return. He recites letters to his parents, trying to explain his decision to them, and to himself. Interestingly, he also uses food as symbolism; namely the Chinese reunion dinner dish, steamboat. What begins as something potentially indulgent morphs into something that, although is still centred on Lui, manages to apply to us all on a universal level, in more than one sense of the word (the topics of space and science come to the fore towards the end of the show). Lui weaves in some other heavy topics – cultural identity, politics, philosophy, suicide, domestic abuse – while also injecting humour and entertainment into his work overall; no mean feat. It’s exhibitionist, it’s confronting, it’s intensely personal and honest. Lui bares all without flinching, and in a way that doesn’t make us flinch either. Whenever you might seem unsure of his view, in disagreement even, Lui pulls you back around to see it through his eyes and mind. It would be easy to amp up the shock value aspects of the show, but Lui unveils his thoughts gently yet all the more powerfully through his masterful storytelling.
