Asian Civilisations Museum, home of the mini fashion exhibition, is letting go of its popular director, perhaps marking the end of the museum’s lightweight fashion displays

Three installations of #SGFASHIONNOW. Clockwise from top: in 2021, 2022, 2023 (Korea). File photos (top and bottom right): Zhao Xiangji for SOTD. Photo (bottom left): lasallesingapore/Instagram

Yesterday morning, on his Facebook page, the director of the Asian Civilisations Museum Kennie Tng posted a rather cryptic message: “…the beginning is the end is the beginning 🤫 (including the shushing face emoji)”. This is the title of the Smashing Pumpkins’ single that was featured in the soundtrack of the Joel Schumacher-directed 1997 film Batman and Robin. “I am a master of a nothing place”? An hour earlier, Mr Ting also shared on FB a report published in The Straits Times that he will be stepping down as the museum’s director on the last day of June. He told ST that he wishes to return to his “first love”—writing. “I have not been able to really promote myself as a writer all these years given my heavy work commitments at the museum,” he said. “I wish to take the rest of the year to do this, and also travel to some of the port cities featured in my new book. And, with luck, also start writing a new book.”

Kennie Tng, who is also the group director of museums here under the auspices of the National Heritage Board (NHB), repositioned ACM as “Singapore’s national museum of Asian antiquities and decorative art” in 2020. He has been key to ACM’s hosting of exhibitions of modern fashion in the past five years of his tenure, positioning his main charge as “Singapore’s fashion museum”, as some members of the media enthusiastically described it. Although he has not promoted himself as a writer, he has as a fashion impresario. Mr Ting is behind two “blockbusters”—Guo Pei: Chinese Art and Couture in 2019 and Andrew Gn: Fashioning Singapore and the World in 2023, as well as smaller productions, mainly the grassroots-friendly, TikTok-fied #SGFASHIONNOW (yes, in full caps). Under his watch, ACM has also put together two permanent galleries: Fashion and Textile, and Jewellery, both to showcase historical Asian dress and textiles, as well as adornments.

The first #SGFASHIONNOW at ACM in 2021. File photo: Zhao Xiangji for SOTD

ACM’s strength is in clothing of the past as seen in 2020’s Fashion Revolution: Chinese Dress from the Late Qing to 1976, 2021’s Fashionable in Asia, and 2022’s Batik Kita (Our Batik): Dressing in Port Cities. Although regrettably small, these exhibitions were fascinating as they were uncommon in the fashion calendar of our island. But exhuming past garments without drawing the dots to show why they were, for instance, “fashionable” was not necessarily elucidating for visitors looking to see more than attractive, no-longer-worn clothes. Similarly, the puny #SGFASHIONNOW exhibitions, with three installations (of which the final was staged in Korea last year as a sort of greatest hits of the previous two), did not express what indeed was “now”, and why. Put together jointly with Lasalle College of Art to allow selected students to dip their hands in curatorial work, the exhibitions were, at best, juvenile.

The fate of the fashion component of the museum is not clear. We do not know what lies ahead for #SGFASHIONNOW. The directorship of ACM will go to Clement Onn, “principal curator of Asian export art and Peranakan and deputy director of curatorial and research, at ACM and TPM”, according to NHB. Mr Onn has not said what he would do with ACM’s fashion initiatives. He told ST somewhat vaguely: “My job is to consolidate all the legacies and also to find my, and my team’s, new voice.” Fashion, even if exemplar of “craftsmanship” (to borrow ACM’s pet phrase), has never been priority in much of our artistic and cultural representations and pursuits. It looks like Kennie Ting would be the last to stitch the fabric of what we wore and wear, and show them. Mr Ting, we were told by those who know him, is “not really a fashion person”, hence the feeble #SGFASHIONNOW. It is not clear if his successor is. Spotlight on fashion in our museums may very well be dimmed.