We are manifold by necessity. There is the version of us that knows exactly what to do, and the version that is still trying to figure it out. One side stays steady for the world, while the other navigates the quiet, internal doubts. Both exist in the same breath, regardless of which one is being seen.
The exact moment
Audrey Desmond (Marketing Lead)
I used to own a lenticular ruler and was fascinated by how it worked. With a small tilt, the image would transform completely. I remember moving it with painstaking slowness, trying to catch the exact moment one image faded into the next. It’s a nostalgic memory of playing with an object that brought me so much joy—seeing how all those different images were always there, just waiting for the right angle to be seen.
Spin print by Cindy Suen
_________________
Ricky Sim (Artistic Director)
I used to think I was slowly becoming one clear version of myself as I grew older. Now I realise I’ve carried many lives inside this one body — the eager beginner, the one who doubted everything, the one who failed quietly, and the one who chose to try again. At each stage, I thought that was who I would always be. Looking back now, I see they were all necessary seasons that shaped how I stand today.
Growing older hasn’t erased those earlier selves. They sit with me when I make choices, reminding me how little I once understood and how much patience I needed. Sometimes I see younger people walking paths I know well. I feel the urge to step in and protect them from mistakes I once made. But I’ve learned that understanding grows through experience, not instruction alone.
These days I no longer rush to explain life’s lessons. I trust that time will do its work, just as it did with me, slowly and faithfully.
Contradictions & Complements
Charlene Lim (Admin Executive)
We’re taught to see life in binaries, which is a comfortable way of thinking because it simplifies complexity. Along the way, we forget that these attributes exist on the same spectrum; they aren’t opposites but complements. These qualities refine and regulate each other. We carry both, and which one is foregrounded depends on context.
Uncertainty keeps the steady self reflective. The steady self keeps uncertainty from spiraling. Humans are, after all, complex beings who hold multiple capacities layered within them at once. We are both strong AND weak, confident AND insecure, smart AND foolish. To be manifold, rather to be human, is not to be contradictory, but to be dimensional.
When writing the prompt, I thought back to Grabkowska’s WHAT MADE ME which inspired many of my academic and personal projects, for its ability to capture the nuances and complexity of people and thought it was fitting to be the image for this prompt (even if it’s not exactly the same concept).
WHAT MADE ME by Dorota Grabkowska
Ferns & Herbs
Matthew Goh (Company Dancer)
My recent love for gardening has prompted me to slow down, observe and appreciate. Growing plants takes patience, understanding them takes time and seeing them bloom brings a quiet feeling of joy.
It has been a surprise to encounter this experience! As I work my hands into the soil, prune the plants and silently “speak” to them. It feels as though we are sharing a collective presence of time, breathing and living.
“The truth is, nature doesn’t speak in words — it teaches through presence, patience, and quiet observation.”
– Mathees Asinsha
Source: Medium.com
Faint Lines, Lingering Light
Esther Ong (Company Manager)
What remains is not the path itself, but the feeling of it. A subtle shift in how space might be entered, how attention might be held. Long after it is gone, the impression persists, soft, unresolved and difficult to name.
This is how Hideo Kobayashi’s photographic works linger in my memory. The light in his work does not follow a predictable path. It bends and drifts around what it meets. Watching it, the world feels slightly altered, as if the space itself remembers the line that once passed through. It leaves no fixed route, yet it edges quietly into perception, shaping how we move, notice and hold a moment in mind.
I notice my own traces in the spaces I pass through: the glow that lingers on pavement after a streetlight flickers off in my neighbourhood, the brief reflection along a windowpane, the way sunlight shifts quietly across a clearing. These fleeting marks may never form a road, yet they linger in subtle ways, shaping the landscapes around me and the moments I touch without knowing.
“Interrupted Place/trace” Emon Photo Gallery, Tokyo Filming “Streetlight”