Charles Lim 1
Details
Charles Lim 1
Metadata (MODS) |
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| Titles | Charles Lim 1: Clip 1 |
| Name | Charles Lim |
| Name | Dr. Joanne Leow |
| Type of Resource | sound recording-nonmusical |
| Genre | Interview |
| Identifier | Interview |
| Identifier | Charles Lim 1 |
| Abstract | Charles Lim recounts childhood experiences that helped shape his engagements with the sea in his SEA STATE projects. |
| Extent | 5:45 |
| Form | sound recording |
| Note | Charles Lim: My name is Charles Lim, Charles Lim Yi Yong. I am an artist. [0:06] Joanne Leow: I guess I just want to start talking about SEA STATE first. Maybe to ask a general question: you’ve been working on it for over a decade now, or you were saying since you were a child you’ve been thinking about these ideas. Charles Lim: Yeah. Joanne Leow: What’s that like, to engage in a project that has such a long duration? [0:20] Charles Lim: Actually when I was an artist I didn’t really think of doing it. In fact, I was kind of running away from this sea thing because I grew up around the sea, and then, you know, my father actually has a close connection to the sea. He’s a kind of a self-taught sailor. I think I spent more time in the water than on land in some sense, actually. So, there are many, kind of like, layers of how I engage with the sea, in a sense. Actually I lived—I grew up—in this village called Mata Ikan, which was kind of like a village kampong, actually, that was by the sea. But by the time I was there, when I was born, the sea was not there actually, it was actually reclaimed land. It was actually…you know, I was living in this house and my grandmother was making paint for, this whitewash paint for—not really paint, and there was a pile of seashells in front of the house, and she would take it and then she would burn it, and then the ashes would be mixed with some liquid and then she would make these like, whitewash paint for people to buy. So, I grew up seeing that, actually. And then she had this small little shrine temple to the goddess of the sea, and I was living there and…what was interesting was that when I was growing up there was this land, kind of like desert space, right in front of me. So, I never saw it as the industrial, to me it’s like, just the space that I grew up. And then I remember trying to get to the sea, and I would walk across the desert, and then, I think it took me something like an hour to get… [1:59] Joanne Leow: And that was the land that was being settled, right, they need to settle it— Charles Lim: Yeah, that was, yeah. Joanne Leow: —before they can build anything on it. [2:03] Charles Lim: Yeah, I think those days they would take something like four years. So there was this space of just nothing happening. But later on, I found out there actually was things happening while they were waiting, actually. I remember—but my experience was the going to the sea, and then, you know, it’s like, living at kampong, and then, you know, we had all this…myths and stories around water. Basically, mainly to scare children from getting into the water, the whole ju gui [water spirit] thing, you know. 2:34 Joanne Leow: So you don’t drown. Charles Lim: But then as a kid you want to fight against that, also. So, I always ended up playing in drains, longkangs, and then going to the sea. I remember going to the shoreline and then there would be a granite shore because they had to use the granite to fortify the shore. And then, you know, I’ll pick up woods from—pieces of wood, and my friend, and then we’d build a little hut. It’s kind of like a childhood fantasy—I think most kids have it—a kind of home away from home. So, I’d build a hut there and then go back home and then a few days later I’ll come back to that hut. [3:06] Joanne Leow: And so this is the ‘80s? Charles Lim: Yeah, this was in the ‘80s… Joanne Leow: ‘70s, ‘80s? [3:12] Charles Lim: ‘70s, ‘80s. So I was very young then, and I grew up there, and my father was like, self-taught sailing enthusiast. He joined the yacht club in Changi, which was started by, I think it was like, RAF [Royal Air Force] and NCOs [Singapore Air Force Non-Commissioned Officers’ Club], actually. And, the club was very quiet, I remember. And then he made me sail, he loved sailing. Actually I remember not liking it, but then what happened was that once I went on this sailing class where they put me in the boat, and I was able to steer the boat wherever I could, I found it really liberating, actually. Then I kind of got hooked onto it. But I was not really into competitive sailing at that point in time. So, you know, I would go to races, and then I would come in last all the time, I wouldn’t care, and I would frustrate my father. But then what happened was that, actually, when I was like, around twelve years old, I had a growth spurt, I became quite big. I was almost the same size as I am now, yeah. And then what happened was that there was a coach and he saw that I was so big, and basically what happened was that I was kind of like groomed and trained to become a crew. So, I’m not—so, what happened was I became connected with very competitive sailing, but I wasn’t the person that was steering the boat, I was the person that was like the helper on the boat. So, I was racing on boats that maybe have two people on board. And then through that, actually, I got onto the national team, and then I started doing a lot of competitive sailing. And then at some point in time I was like, training for the Olympics, so I was doing that. So what happens is that, yeah I was sailing in the sea a lot, racing in the sea, around Changi actually, in this area called Seafix, around Loyang… [4:57] Joanne Leow: Pasir Ris, and… Charles Lim: …around this area also between Ubin and Tekong. Joanne Leow: Yeah. Charles Lim: And also there are these races around Ubin… Joanne Leow: So quite a closed area, actually. Charles Lim: Quite a close area, yeah. And then the Johor Lama also, because during that time, I think, the border was still quite like…you know, you could just… Joanne Leow: Low-key. Charles Lim: …you could actually just take a sailing boat and go across, go into the kampong. Joanne Leow: Not anymore. Charles Lim: You can’t do that anymore. Joanne Leow: No. [5:20] Charles Lim: I used to do that all the time, actually. This one time I think I was supposed to race around Ubin, and being the non-competitive person I was…all my friends were racing around and then I would actually stop and then go to Johor, walk around (laughs), then I’d get on the boat and then continue to race. And then I remember I got, like, scolding for that, “why the hell did you do that?” So I was really exploring, actually. |
| Access Condition | Contact Dr. Joanne Leow |
| Subject Geographic | Pacific Ocean |
| Subject Hierarchical Geographic | Asia--Singapore------Singapore |
| 2010-2020-1970-1980-1980-1990-1990-2000-2000-2010 | |
| Subject Local Name | ----Water--Sailing--Pacific Ocean--2010-2020--1970-1980--1980-1990--1990-2000--2000-2010 |