Queer visual art is a notable countercultural facet of contemporary Singaporean society, which currently criminalises, albeit unenforced, consensual, private sexual acts between men (legal for women) through the continued presence of laws such as Section 377A of the Penal Code.
[1] As homosexuality has been considered a taboo subject, practitioners in Singapore have historically contended with a host of limitations, with the avoidance of positive queer representation in local mainstream media, to operating with the risk of being blacklisted by the state, or vilification due to homophobia and transphobia from conservative aspects of wider Singaporean society.
The 2005 exhibition at The Substation, Bao Bei, by Singaporean artist Jason Wee, which featured pixelated male genitalia,[11] was mentioned in the press release and deemed to be "innocuous" by the state.
[12][7][13][14] Ong's work from the 1980s, for instance, would feature black-and-white charcoal drawings that depicted nude, queer male bodies in various contexts and relationships.
[16] One of her paintings on display was a self-portrait, titled Monkey & Thinker, now in the collection of NUS Museum and shown at their 2017 exhibition, Radio Malaya: Abridged Conversations About Art.
[2] During the 12-hour AGA New Year's Eve show from 31 December 1993 to 1 January 1994, Josef Ng staged a performance work, Brother Cane, in protest at the arrest of 12 homosexual men during anti-gay operations in 1993, whose personal details were published in local mainstream newspapers.
[23] Red + White = Pink was held at Utterly Art, with participating artists including Genevieve Chua, Tania De Rozario, Jane Porter, Aidah Dolrahim, Teng Nee Cheong, Martin Loh, Desmond Sim, Ernest Chan Tuck Yew, Justin Lee, Michael Lee Hong Hwee, Han Kiang Siew, Zulharli Adnan, Brian Gothong Tan, Lim Jit Hwang, Sazeli Jalal, Jason Wee, Daniel Poh, Wong Hong Weng, Nicholas Chai and Aiman Hakim.
[3] The homoerotic content of the work was considered to contravene the law on pornography by the museum, and contextually relevant gay pornographic magazines were removed from the installation without prior consultation with either the artist, biennale director Matthew Ngui or curators Russell Storer and Trevor Smith.
[32] The jury felt that the depiction of gay marriage and topics addressed by the film were important and that the personal approach by Tan made it “even more poignant”.
[34] The second art exhibition of IndigNation was held from 10 to 16 August 2005 at The Box, entitled Solitary Desire and featured pieces by Ong Jenn Long and Steve Chua, both of whom were young artists.