Maria Taniguchi: Afterimage

Eighteen years of painting rectangles by hand, and no two of them the same.

Go alone, go slowly and go before 22 November. Afterimage at the Singapore Art Museum is the Filipino artist Maria Taniguchi's first solo exhibition presented by a Singapore museum, and it is built on a single untitled, unnumbered series she has worked on since 2008: canvases covered in rectangles like brickwork, each one pencilled in and then painted by hand, a process that can take days, weeks or months. The compromise is that nothing here shouts. If you need a show to grab you at the door, this one won't; if you will stand close enough to see the pencil lines, it pays you back.

Many of the brick paintings lean against the walls rather than hang, which makes them feel less like trophies and more like work in progress. Look closely and the labour shows. Curator Haeju Kim's point, as Bakchormeeboy reported it, is simple: "no two rectangles are exactly the same."

Then there are the Runaways (2026), towering wooden structures carved from duhat, or Java plum. The same feature notes that the tree was planted by Taniguchi's mother while she was pregnant with the artist, which gives the sculptures an unexpectedly tender back story. Four films complete the picture, including a new SAM commission shot at her mother's home, studio and garden in Dumaguete City.

Two dates are worth planning around. On Sunday 25 October there is a panel on material experimentation at 2pm and a performance by Sigma Contemporary Dance at 3.30pm. A curator tour runs on Saturday 21 November at 3pm, the day before it closes (leaving it that late is a choice, not a plan).

It is on Level 3, Gallery 3, at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, and general admission is free for citizens and PRs.

Good to know Until 22 November 2026, Level 3, Gallery 3, SAM at Tanjong Pagar Distripark, 39 Keppel Road. Open 10am–7pm. General Admission free for citizens and PRs; check SAM's site for other visitors and programme sign-ups.

Maria Taniguchi: Afterimage | Singapore Art Museum, Tanjong Pagar Distripark, 39 Keppel Road, Singapore 089065