Member Article

MALAYSIAN COLLECTIVE BORNEO BENGKEL USE INNOVATIVE PLATFORM LIVING ARCHIVE TO BRING TOGETHER CREATIVES FROM ACROSS BORNEO AND THE UK

27 creatives from 5 countries; Sarawak, Sabah (Malaysia), Kalimantan (Indonesia), England, Scotland & Northern Ireland (UK) featured in interactive exhibition and performance, presenting spoken word, endangered languages, music and sounds from the world around them via digital archiving platform Living Archive.

An innovative British technology platform, Living Archive, is being utilised to bring together creatives from around the world and present their work at a literary festival in Malaysia.

Borneo Bengkel is curating an exhibition entitled sem/bunyi featuring selected work from Borneo Bengkel’s previous international programmes Soundbank and Lingua Franca, created digitally during the pandemic, presenting them physically for the first time in Malaysia.

A play on two Malay words - sembunyi, meaning ‘to hide’ and bunyi, translated as ‘sound’ - this exhibition features poetry, photography, video and sound installation produced by collaborators from across Borneo (Sarawak, Sabah and Kalimantan) and the United Kingdom (Scotland, Northern Ireland, England), sem/bunyi tells of stories and experiences ‘hidden in plain sight’, often neglected from national narratives, or only discovered by curious observers.

The collaboration was made possible by utilising a newly developed app Living Archive, through which creatives from South-East Asia and the United Kingdom were able to upload, share, and re-mixed audio and visuals, without ever physically meeting. The outcome; Soundbank, a digital archive and playspace of music, visuals and found sound, will be featured in the exhibition, to be hosted at George Town Literary Festival in Penang, Malaysia at the end of November.

The exhibition invites audiences to explore and reflect on these audio-visual documentations of cultural identities, indigenous languages, folk music and found sound, and to create their own sonic journey by utilising screens and QR codes placed within the gallery.

Co-curated by Borneo Bengkel team mates; Malaysian Sonia Luhong Wan and British Catriona Maddocks, the project is aiming for an immersive and experimental approach.

Catriona said “The work we’re presenting was produced throughout the pandemic, when despite national lockdowns we managed to create these really exciting collaborative projects- Soundbank which gathered 16 musician from around the world to document and record music, folk songs and sounds from the world around them, and Lingua Franca a spoken word performance which presented work by diverse and often marginalised poets from the UK and Malaysia. We’re really excited to have the chance to present these to our first ever physical audience and see how people interact with them”

Sonia added “Both of these projects came from the realisation last year, that while we were all so separated from one another, the digital world gives us so many opportunities to connect with people from distant places. Using Living Archives gave us the opportunity to bring creatives together in an innovative way, and use technology to create conversation and talk openly about race, gender, religion and identity. It’s a great experience to now translate all of that into an exhibition.”

The physical exhibition presents the work via Living Archive, a digital archiving platform, developed by Nick John Williams, a sound artist and musician based in Whitley Bay. Nick said “The platform was developed during the pandemic, as a way to present and share work when no live performances could happen. It’s really exciting to see how this project is uniting people from thousands of miles away, who have never met, and providing a platform for them to share and learn about one another’s lives and creative experiences. We’re looking forward to see how Borneo Bengkel take our digital platform and present it into an exhibition format”

Catriona added “Borneo Bengkel previously presented Soundbank at the internationally renowned festival Rainforest World Music Festival held in Sarawak, but this is the first time we’re really enabled audiences to interact with our work on Living Archive, so we envisage there are lots of possibilities for experimentation and play”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Anna Toms .