Singapore opens US0-M iconic cultural center

SINGAPORE — A series of big shows has been lined up as this affluent city state inaugurated last week its US$300-million Esplanade Theatres on the Bay, Singapore’s answer to the world-famous Sydney Opera House.

Billed as Esplanade Opening Festival (Oct. 13-Nov.3), this visually stunning 22-day show celebrates the finest of popular and classical, traditional and contemporary forms of theatres, music and dance featuring more than 1,300 artists from 22 countries, performing in 70 different productions and 600 free events.

Singapore’s dream of being a premier regional hub for culture and the arts became a reality with the opening of this waterfront cultural center that offers facilities with acoustics that will rival or surpass even the Royal Albert Hall’s or Palais Garnier’s.

Dubbed “The Big Durians” after a spikylooking Southeast Asian fruit or “Flies’ Eyes”, the iconic center has a 2,000-seat theatre, 1,600-seat concert hall and outdoor performance spaces.

In the vicinity of Esplanade Theatres on the Bay are over 5,000 world-class hotel rooms, two major convention centers, 1,000 shops, 300 restaurants and 150 bars.

The eye-catching roof-top cladding of the Esplanade is made of fixed aluminium sunshades and double-glazed, laminated glass panes. Each pane measures 125 meters long and 95 meters wide. There are over 10,000 glass panes on the shells of the Concert Hall and Theatre.

The 8,600 square-meter, three-storey Esplanade Mall offers a superb arts-related shopping experience with its mix of retail, food and entertainment outlets and Library@Esplanade, Singapore’s first performing arts library.

Better known as a regional business center, Singapore hopes the Esplanade will be at the forefront of a push to lure world-class music and performance acts and encourage its own artists to be more active.

The Esplanade “will offer Singaporeans the stage to develop and connect artistically and culturally to the world,” Singapore’s President S. R. Nathan said in a statement.

But its critics say Singapore is more interested in using the center to boost tourism revenue with big-ticket international attractions, rather than be a venue for performances by up-and-coming Singapore artists.

It has been said that until now, Singapore’s government has done little to encourage its citizens to take up arts. State funding for local arts groups is limited to S$5 million (US$ 2.8 million) a year.

As a first step to the opening of the cultural center, Singapore officials recently promised to review tight censorship laws, which ban artists from focusing on topics such as race and homosexuality.

“We want no censorship. We want experimental groups taking more risk in arts programs here,” said Alvin Tan, from a local theater, The Necessary Stage. “It’s very difficult to be creative when you are scared.”

The Esplanade Theatres on the Bay opened on Saturday, Oct. 12. Thousands of people gathered at the 6-hectare site in Marina Bay from 5 p.m. to watch outdoor performances that included mime artists, acrobats, acapella singers and stiltwalkers and death-defying aerial stunts. A group of Filipino singers also serenaded during the inaugural rites. VIPs present included Prime Minister Go Thong and Senior Minister Lew Kuan Yew.

Later in the evening, President S. R. Nathan and the First Lady, other VIPs and members of the international media watched the Singapore Dance Theatre perform Indonesian choreographer Boi Sakti’s new work, “Reminiscing the Moon”, in the theatre.

This was followed by a half-hour show of pyrotechnics, illuminated pumpboats and flying acrobats.

At least 60 print and broadsheet journalists from more than 20 countries came upon the invitation of the Esplanade and the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) for the opening of the Esplanade. Among Filipino journalists who came were Ces Drilon and Timy Nubla of ABS-CBN News Network, Jessica Soho of GMA Channel 7 and Impy Pilapil, art and culture columnist of the Philippine Star. Some 100 Singapore-based correspondents from wire agencies and TV and radio networks such as AFP, Bloomberg and the BBC also covered the event.

The “Reminiscing the Moon” show was followed on Oct. 14-15 by The London Philharmonic Orchestra with Kurt Masur, conducting. It featured Sarah Chang, an 18-year old US-born violinist to Korean parents.