kwodrent (Grace Tan)

Grace Tan, a versatile artist hailing from Malaysia, embarked on her artistic journey in 2003. Her early fascination with rectangles and construction methods led to the creation of the kwodrent series, a collection of wearable fabric structures. As time progressed, her artistic repertoire expanded to encompass sculptural objects and site-specific installations. Guided by a profound appreciation for geometry, Tan's work is celebrated for its tactile qualities that accentuate both material and form.

Tan's talent and innovative approach have earned her recognition, including the President's Design Award for Building as a Body in 2012 and the Young Artist Award in 2013. In 2015, her collaborative project GROUND with FARM Architects was selected for the National Gallery Singapore's art connector project.

Her works have been showcased at various international and regional events, including S.E.A. Focus (2020), Inside Out Sydney (2017), Singapore Biennale (2013), Setouchi Triennale (2013), State of Design in Melbourne (2008-2010), Singapore Design Festival (2007), London Design Week (2006), and Aichi World Expo (2005). Notable solo exhibitions include n. 355 – natural progression at the Asian Civilisations Museum (2019), A Common Thread: Archiving a Practice at FOST Gallery Singapore (2018), and Materials and Method at POLA Museum Annex Tokyo (2018).

Her group exhibitions include Discrete Encoding and In Random Order at FOST Gallery Singapore (2019), Shapes in Symmetry at Nanyang Technological University ADM Gallery (2018), And of Such Things at Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore (2016), The Measure of Your Dwelling: Singapore as Unhomed at ifa Gallery Berlin (2015), and Erasure: From Conceptualism to Abstraction at Osage Gallery Hong Kong (2014).

In recent years, Tan has worked on several large public art commissions in Singapore, such as Woven Field at Downtown Line Little India Station (2015), PLANES and CURRENTS at Marina One (2017), SYMMETRY at DUO (2017), and n. 333—State of Equilibrium at Raffles City (2018). Her works are in private and corporate collections, as well as institutions such as the POLA Museum in Japan.