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Monday, August 17, 2009

 

Shine a light on me

It has been slightly less than a year since I returned to Singapore and as the requirements of urbanisation and capitalism dictate, the city-scape of buildings continues to evolve and mutate. However, as was the case in the X-men saga, it appears that a quantum leap has occurred.

The flash point seems to have been the staging of the Formula One night race in Singapore, starting off an obsession with bright lights. The advent of LED technology has brought on a massive onslaught of candela, much like how an 8 year-old learns a new profanity and peppers every other sentence with it in a craving for accelerated acceptance into adulthood.

I watched this event unfold on my laptop during an uncharacteristically warm afternoon in Manchester. I had hoped to find some bottles of Tiger in the local supermarket to make me feel closer to home while watching, but that was not to be and I had to settle for an indulgently-sized packet of Indian Delights aka muruku, in eager anticipation of seeing the sights of home.

In-between ogling at grid girls (let's face it, that's what they're there for) and a palm-to-forehead moment involving our Prime Minister and an esoteric weather prediction, my first observation was that nearly everything in sight was bathed in coloured light of some sort. Apart from the usual urban illumination from familiar skyscrapers, everything from historical colonial buildings and bridges to the pirated version of the London Eye glowed an odd spectrum of colours like how I'd imagine a chemically-enhanced Alice in Wonderland screenplay to be. Perhaps that was the intention.

Fast-forward to the present time. A much-vaunted overhaul of the shopping district we know as Orchard Road seems to have centered on the elaborately-designed facade of Ion Orchard, yet another shopping mall with the lofty, if unoriginal claim of revolutionising the shopping experience. A large metal framework forms a contoured surface that serves as a ceiling for the area immediately outside the entrance, towering about 4-5 floors above ground level. At first sight, it looks like a crude wireframe rendering of a 3-D surface in CAD software but its futuristic aesthetic quality comes from the glowing LEDs at the nodes of the wireframe. These extend across the sides of the building to complete what looks like a very organised battalion of fireflies marching across undulating terrain and changing colour on cue.

Another example is Wilkie Edge, along Selegie Road. It sticks out as a curious oddity at the corner of the cross junction, a shiny glass exterior and an obscenely bright LED screen incongruously juxtaposed (I've always wanted to use those two words together!) against the adjacent old-school gaudiness of neon-lights proclaiming the dominance of dodgy KTV lounges and the Chivas and Hennessey they serve in the dated Peace Centre. On the opposite side of Selegie Rd, a row of grotty shophouses goes about their usual business of serving soyabean curd and chicken rice, oblivious to the glare and din of advertisements screaming for attention like a spoilt pre-pubescent heiress. A short distance down Selegie, this show of modernity comes to an abrupt stop as the sights and sounds of Little India beckon.

Up at Bugis Street, the facade of Iluma reminds me of Space Invaders, but this time with aliens intent on forming up to spell words like a National Day Parade rather than destroying the Earth. Situated beside what used to be a hotbed of activity for women and food of dubious origin and hygiene, this mall is an attempt to bring back the tourism heydays of those licentious times with more socially acceptable forms of commerce and night life. At times, I wonder if the facade lights are a nod with a sly wink to the sequinned outfits of the early-day proprietors of that street. In terms of sheer luminosity though, they certainly represent a step forward.

Seeing these examples come into being, as well as similar efforts at Clarke Quay and along the Singapore River started me wondering about what drives the design of our urban landscape. It might be that in order to plug into the increasingly globalised world economy, our city has to give the impression of vibrancy 24-7 and piles on the light show in typically Singaporean kiasu fashion, the long-standing traditions of Geylang notwithstanding.

On the other hand, perhaps it reaches into our deep-seated primitive instincts. Like magpies to twinkling trinkets, we humans have not evolved beyond being fascinated by bright and shiny objects.

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