Folklore, Myth, and the Otherworldly

Through myth and symbolism, Zarina Muhammad’s work, currently on display at St John’s Island as part of the Singapore Biennale, embodies the diverse earthly and non earthly inhabitants of South-east Asia.

- MICHELE KOH MOROLLO

Covid-19 and climate change have left the world on edge and anxious about the environment, communities, and the future of humanity. In such uncertain times, many of us question the veracity of historical and cultural narratives that have guided us for generations.

Hence, folk magic and animism are experiencing a resurgence as some of us wonder if the “old ways” might offer a remedy to the problems of postmodernity during such tumultuous times. This is why Singaporean artist, researcher and educator Zarina Muhammad’s work is particularly relevant right now.

“We desire to tap into the vastness of ecologies and ourselves, and perhaps imagine larger, broader ways of creating habitable universes,” says Zarina. She believes that right now, we might be craving a closer link with the land, a renewed connection to our ancestral traditions, and other ways of experiencing and engaging with the world.

“The passage of time since 2020 has amplified a sense of a ‘dead end’, of abrupt stops and having to remain still for a moment on an individual and collective level. Possibly, we have hurtled through spaces in which opportunities to unlearn, relearn, and dwell in the process of re-renegotiating notions of habitat, safety, belonging, isolation, grief, community, inequity, precarity, care, and survival arose.”

Working at the intersections of performance, mixed media installation, text, sound, moving image, and participatory practice, Zarina becomes a cultural ventriloquist for South-east Asian communities and natural and supernatural entities. Much of her art involves themes of traditional Southeast Asian mythology and folklore, liminal spaces, otherworldly themes, the supernatural, and natural elements.