Hard Work

Hanging 2000 pieces of ping pong balls dipped in silver paint was no laughing matter. As curator of the Arts Lounge I'm quite spoiled, to say the least, when it comes to the set up of every exhibition I've curated so far. Our collective vision for this current one was something whimsical and to me quite magical. I mean, we were dealing with art based on horoscopes and star signs after all.

Our original plan was to construct 3 whirling star from the ceiling, a sort of a nebula model or a galaxy of ping pong balls. It proved difficult and crappy. We had a hard time making the dynamo machine to rotate very slowly. At the last minute our GM decided that we would just hang all those ping pong balls in a stretch of black cloth, covering the entire middle ceiling of the lounge. It's quite easy relatively, what with super glue and all, but then we were given only about 5 hours to accomplish all these things. Oh, we did preparations beforehand, of course. But the limited time was really challenging.

That's what I like about this hotel. Nobody complains during crunch time. It's just amazing how the staff - the engineering guys, front office, f&b and the managers - would all come to the Arts Lounge and help in the set-up.

I was up till 4am making sure those silver circles were painted correctly. It turned out fine and we really are loving the new mood of the space.

Those guys are from our printed materials supplier. I swear I'm always promising them I'l have our collats printed early but of course it doesn't happen. Their always scratching their heads everytime I have our invites printed because I'm telling you it's not the usual invites you see around. It goes with the theme of the whole exhibit.

The fortune teller's booth had me worried but this corner was the most popular. We had to tell our guests that we're stopping the fortune telling coz it was already very late.

Anyway, I'm just thankful that the opening and exhibit went great. And for those pips who wished me luck in selling the art, well, I'm happy to report that we've sold 2 pieces already!