Altered Systems: Marvin Tang & Seet Yun Teng

In “Garden States”, Marvin Tang’s final work, “Further Reading,” proposes an ambiguity in our relationship with nature, calling us to embrace this dichotomy despite its strangeness.

In this 90-minute conversation at Guoco Midtown's Public Art Wall, Marvin will share how his earlier projects anchored in Tengah prior to its construction reflect his attempts to archive the forest and trace the evolving ways we define greenery. This will also expand to his current exploration where research data shapes the way we green our environment.

Alongside this sharing, curator and Tengah resident Seet Yun Teng will revisit her essay, “Climate Control: Tropical Cooling Infrastructure & Sociality in Tengah’s ‘Forest Town’”. Focusing on the Central Cooling System (CCS) as a case study, she will explore the “eco-smart” infrastructural enchantments of Tengah and reflect on her earlier digital ethnography of resident group chats, considering how such social circulations have shifted over the past year.

Together, they will discuss how urban interventions and infrastructures shape our encounters with nature, from daily, lived interactions to larger scales of urban planning and government policy.