Conversations with Sharon Chin and Zedeck Siew
Through The Eyes Of Artists, A Glimpse Of Malaysia
22 May 2016 - Port Dickson, Negri Sembilan, Malaysia
A lot of art now skips that crucial local step. I want to address a specific audience that feels very real. The criticism I get is, “Don’t you want more people to see your art?” But I think that’s how it spreads. If I zoom in on the local and the specific, it has more resonance outside. Even the thought that it starts from the outside doesn’t make sense to me. – Sharon Chin
After several hours of rolling past kilometres of palm oil plantations, the bus pulls into Port Dickson. Back in the 1980s, I recall Port Dickson being described as one of the several short holiday destinations that were but a drive away from Singapore, much like Fraser’s Hill or Melaka or Kota Tinggi.
It was only in 2016 that I paid my maiden visit to the sleepy coastal town that is only 72km from Kuala Lumpur.
Objectively speaking, PD - as it’s affectionately called – doesn’t inspire confidence. The beaches aren’t of the white sandy sort one might expect of a “beach resort”; the waters don’t look clean enough for a swim; most of the buildings – commercial and residential – look the worse for wear, some altogether unfinished and abandoned.
But, Mackerel didn’t travel to PD for a holiday. Art and conversation were our purpose and we imposed on the hospitality of two of Malaysia’s emerging talents – visual artist Sharon Chin and writer Zedeck Siew.
KEEPING THEIR DISTANCE
Sharon: I don’t blame people who live in KL for thinking that KL is Malaysia (chuckle chuckle). May be because it’s a valley, right? Like a vortex, you can’t get a sense of perspective.
Zedeck: I think it’s easy to have this sense that KL = Malaysia. We’re quite inclined to think in centralised ways in this country. Very Putrajaya.
Even with art, as with many of the happening (ie: cool, significant, important) things in Malaysia, Zedeck says that much of the country’s theatre is concentrated in KL; so, too, the galleries. It was only fairly recently that theatre in Penang came into its own.
“That’s because Penang is an opposition state,” Zedeck offers.
Having lived in KL for about 10 years, Sharon and Zedeck made the decision to relocate to PD in 2011. It was a homecoming for Zedeck and the case of “uptown girl” for Sharon who is originally from KL.
Sharon: It took me two years to fully adjust to PD. I remember feeling lost for at least a year. It was a bit of an existential crisis. Didn’t make any art in my first year. When we left KL, I was at a crossroads with art. I told myself, “I don’t want to make art anymore. I want to be a political activist.” (Bersih, a movement calling for free and fair elections in Malaysia, was a catalyst for that thought.)
I wasn’t sure of what I was doing anymore.
But, I had lost faith with the art.
Then, one day in 2012, the cloud lifted and I started drawing again. And I started with the weeds in our garden. This coincided with that realisation that “art’s the thing!” It was always the thing and is still the thing now.
PD has given me a clarity about art and politics and my place with those. It helped me to understand how I could help with what I have, more confidence about what I’m doing and can do within my own sphere of influence, which is enough. The idea of self-sacrifice for change is, to me, vile and misguided.
Photo: Sharon works on a drawing of a PD resident's late parents' wedding picture. "It’s easier to interface with people here. 'Oh, you’re an artist? Can you draw me?' I’ve done two portraits so far. Of our gardeners. May be that’s one way I can give something back to this town."
Zedeck: I spent our first two years here in PD writing almost 100 short stories. None were particularly good, but I had to write all that to get started.
(Like the 10,000 hours...)
Zedeck: Yes, and it’s helped my fiction immensely. I have less of an “imposter’s cringe”. The “how dare you call yourself a writer?!” berating. I feel now like I’ve done the necessary work.
Sharon: Zedeck was a child prodigy. (“Yes, you were!” she exclaims turning to face him). He was this kid still in school but hanging around with all these older theatre people.Zedeck: I wanted to move to KL. I was about 14 and thinking, “This town is too small for me. I want to go to the big city. I want to meet cool people. I want to be a cosmopolitan modern person!” I wanted to meet more writers.
(Did it meet your expectations?)
Zedeck: I got a lot out of KL. I worked at an arts and culture website called Kakiseni (and with other similar journals). I lived in KL for 10 years and did the media thing for about half of that. The other half was spent growing up.
I never got around to writing fiction when I was in KL. And now, I don’t have a media job that I can use as an excuse for not writing my fiction.
IN TOUCH WITH THE PULSE OF MALAYSIA
Sharon and Zedeck live in a modest and spartan single-storey house in a middle-class residential estate that sits on the periphery of an oil refinery; the two are separated by the remains of a disused railway track. The flaring is a spectacular sight, especially at night.
The house is the very same one that Zedeck grew up in, and out of. His relocation to PD was a homecoming in every sense of the word.
A productive jackfruit tree greets visitors at the front gate and as you slowly take in the ladies fingers growing in the far corner and the infant papaya trees by the front porch, you increasingly get the feeling that you’re being watched. In a fleeting moment, far too easy to miss, you just might see a small black bundle of skittish energy dart out of the house, bound across the garden and leap into a mess of overgrown hedges just beyond the boundary fence.
Her name is Mini PSB.
Zedeck: Penyu was a cat of ours. Penyu’s sister was a stray that looked like her. Penyu’s sister’s boyfriend was a black tom who liked to hang around Penyu’s sister. Mini PSB is probably one of his kids.
