“Everything is…” (2019) (front and back) | Graphite and acrylic on HIV medication packaging | 42cm x 39cm | Private collection
"The Internalised Self: Atlas" (2018) | Graphite and watercolour on HIV medication packaging | 79.5cm × 54.5cm | Singapore Art Museum collection
“Together” (2020) | Graphite and acrylic on HIV medication packaging | 40cm x 35cm | Private collection
"The Internalised Self: Ganymede" (2018) | Graphite and watercolour on HIV medication packaging | 42cm × 29cm | Singapore Art Museum collection
“Resist” (2019) | Graphite and acrylic on HIV medication packaging | 43cm x 25cm | Private collection
"The Questions, or Who are we, where do we come from, and to what kind of fuckery must we subject ourselves in order to receive the truth?" (2025) | Graphite on HIV medication packaging | 160cm x 278cm | Private collection
Artist talk with curator Sharmin Parameswaran
Artist talk
Poster for "Red & Gold Exhibition" at RAW Art Space, 2017
Red & Gold is an ongoing series of paintings on HIV medication packaging that I’ve been making since 2017. I first showed them in my inaugural solo show, also titled Red & Gold, at RAW Art Space, Kuala Lumpur, in December 2017.
Curated by Sharmin Parameswaran, the show presented about 40 works made between early 2016 and late 2017, after I decided to pursue art full time at the age of 42, after I had been asked to resign from my last job after my employer discovered I was HIV+. Before this show, I had chiefly worked as a writer and musician and only exhibited my art sporadically since 2005.
Red & Gold was an important show and series for me as it set the tone for much of the work I would make in subsequent years, especially the incorporation of human figuration and text, the use of recycled materials and exploration of themes of self, identity and queerness.
R E D & G O L D
I was very interested in how red and gold corresponded to the colours of bodily fluids, in this case blood and urine. Most of the works in this series are made on HIV medication packaging that I collected over the years.
At one point in 2017, I ran out of art paper and couldn’t afford to buy any so I started using the packaging of my HIV meds as a medium. The process inspired me greatly, because the material imbued the human figures I was drawing with layers of meaning that I was struggling to express from hardships I was experiencing at the time.
Over the years, the series has been evolving as my understanding and attitude towards the materials change. In the latest iterations of the series, I don’t use red or gold paint anymore, and I paint on the label side now.
I think it reflects my growing desire to be more transparent about the disease. And as long as I am taking the meds, the series will continue in one form or another.