SINGAPORE – Local designers who are keen to learn about traditional crafts in danger of disappearing now have the chance to work with local craftsmen and create commercially viable products that incorporate such designs.
Peranakan beadwork can potentially be put on shoes. Designs used in rangoli, the Indian art of making patterns, usually on the floor, with flower petals and coloured powder or sand, can go on bedsheets and tablecloths.
On Thursday (July 22), the National Heritage Board (NHB) put out an open call for designers to work with craft practitioners.
This is in line with the board’s efforts to breathe new life into traditional practices whose future is increasingly uncertain.
With fewer and fewer craft practitioners still creating in these traditional forms and local products often struggling to find enough buyers, NHB is hoping that designers will be able to help by reimagining these crafts beyond their well-worn contexts.
“We want to modernise these local products,” NHB’s deputy chief executive of policy and community Alvin Tan said.
“We also hope our intangible cultural heritage will be able to reach new markets and have long-term sustainability.”
Under this initiative – called the Craft x Design – four craft practitioners have been selected, variously involved in Chinese lantern making, ketupat weaving, rangoli making and Peranakan beadwork.
They will be holding a workshop on Aug 21 so that interested designers can learn more about these crafts and see them in action. Designers can then submit a proposal by 6pm on Oct 1 for the co-creation of a new product with any one of the four.
Once selected, they will have four to five months to finish a prototype of the product with the traditional craft practitioner.
The selected designers or design studios will each be given $6,000 as an award, while every practitioner-designer pair can be reimbursed up to $2,000 for materials and other costs.
“Of course, the practitioner has to be comfortable with the end product and feel that it is respectful,” Mr Tan said.
“It is a safe sandbox for them to experiment and hopefully can become a new revenue stream for them.”
Ownership rights will be shared between the practitioner and the designer.
Mr Jimm Wong, 67, who is the Chinese lantern maker selected for the scheme, said designers are creative, know the market well, and can more effectively promote a product.
He learnt how to make Chinese lanterns on his own, a process which took him six to eight years. A pair of lanterns now takes him three to four months to complete, involving more than 100 different processes.
He hopes that with the designer’s help, methods such as 3D printing can be used more efficiently and accelerate the process.
Ms Vijaya Mohan, the current Guinness World Record holder for the largest rangoli pattern ever created and another participant in the scheme, said there is interest in rangoli designs, which are mostly derived from nature.
But she added that people nowadays are too busy to perform this labour-intensive activity.
Rangoli art was initially mostly done by women “as a kind of meditation, like yoga”, she said, to welcome gods and goddesses into the home, to drive away evil spirits, and to give thanks to god.
“It composes your mind. I hope that people of any culture can come and learn the art form and its value. They can then do as they like with it,” the 61-year-old said.
She noted, however, that in modernising the designs, people should be aware that some are more spiritual than others and not to be used for more banal table designs.
“We must still incorporate tradition into it,” she said.
Peranakan beadwork maker Raymond Wong said concerns about cultural appropriation can be overcome through proper research and attribution.
“I believe these crafts have a chance to survive,” Mr Wong, 42, said. “It is no use to anyone if they are dead in a museum.”
The prototypes will be announced in March next year.