#09-1464 is the first solo exhibition by Johann Fauzi (b.1962, Singapore) with Richard Koh Fine Art. An aficionado of Baroque and Rococo aesthetics, the artist has transformed the space of the gallery in Gillman Barracks into a replica of his own HDB apartment, an immersive installation that mimics its lush opulence and intimate atmosphere. The show, curated by Louis Ho, takes its title from the unit number of Johann’s apartment and includes works ranging from large-scale landscape paintings to small still-life images, from ornate furnishings and artefacts to kitschy ceramic sculptures. The interlacing of artwork, found objects, and furniture highlights the artist’s appropriation of European visual and material cultures as a means of questioning and destabilizing, the historical power structures they represent, especially in the context of a former colony in Southeast Asia. The ostentatious excess of the presentation is transformed by the presence of one of the primary thematic concerns of Johann’s practice: the recuperation of the Malay-Muslim cultural universe. The act of appropriation, in his hands, becomes a channel of critical counter-colonization, usurping the prerogatives of Western culture to highlight systemic erasure and marginalization.
