Review: Diplomacy and Desire
Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore at NGS
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore, 2025-2026, exhibition view at National Gallery Singapore. Image courtesy of National Gallery Singapore.
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore is a compelling show that offers historical insight into the artist’s work while making a case for intelligent exhibition design. Curated by Kathleen Ditzig, the show is centred around the Indonesian modern artist’s relationship with Singapore and his circulation among regional diplomatic circles during the postwar nation-building years. Basoeki’s skills as a draughtsman and portraitist propelled his reputation as a highly sought after painter among high-profile patrons in Southeast Asia, from politicians to royal courts and business people. Yet his proximity to the elite class could also be seen as a double-edged sword when it comes to assessing Basoeki’s position within the region’s art history. One notable critic was his contemporary S. Sudjojono, who deemed Basoeki’s work as lacking in social commentary and a mere continuation of the Mooi Indie tradition of idealised beauty. Diplomacy and Desire proposes a more nuanced perspective on Basoeki’s practice and politics against the backdrop of postcolonial Southeast Asia.
This sense of historical consciousness comes through in Ditzig’s rigorous research and engagement with the premise of the show. Diplomacy and Desire is presented inside National Gallery Singapore’s Dalam Southeast Asia, a project space which seeks to “argue for lesser-known narratives”, and “devise more responsive approaches for the display of modern art within the museum”. In short, the project aims to experiment with what collection-based exhibitions could look like and do.
Notably, Ditzig addresses the artworks’ provenance as a starting point which establishes a strong curatorial framework. Diplomacy and Desire is anchored by two monumental oil paintings Basoeki’s gifted to Singapore: Labour (c. 1950s) and Struggle for the Re-establishment of the Democracy and Right for the People (1981). The symbols in the paintings speak to Basoeki’s vision of nation-building for Singapore and the ideals of sovereignty in the region. As gifts to the state, Ditzig argues in the exhibition e-publication that the artworks are markers of Basoeki’s “geopoetic agency” as an artist where he “took on an informal but culturally strategic role in diplomacy”, engaging with the region and art across ideological differences.
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore, 2025-2026, exhibition view at National Gallery Singapore. Image courtesy of National Gallery Singapore.
This sensitivity to historical context is brilliantly extended in the exhibition space, which evokes aspects of Basoeki’s studio at One Tree Hill in Singapore, where he lived from 1958 to 1960. By transforming the space with locally sourced period-appropriate furniture, there is a sense of the types of social spaces Basoeki’s work would have been seen: the picture gallery in his studio, hotel ballrooms which hosted his exhibitions, as well as his patrons’ homes. It is a simple curatorial gesture that pays off well, creating a comfortable environment where visitors could rest and spend time with the artworks and facsimiles of archival materials, produced as pamphlets. As a visual device, the exhibition design signals an aesthetics of power shaped by the taste of the era’s elite class. It is a clever approach towards an immersive experience, foregrounding curatorial intent rather than spectacle.
It is a clever approach towards an immersive experience, foregrounding curatorial intent rather than spectacle.
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore, 2025-2026, exhibition view at National Gallery Singapore. Image courtesy of National Gallery Singapore.
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore, 2025-2026, exhibition view at National Gallery Singapore. Image courtesy of National Gallery Singapore.
Diplomacy and Desire is a conceptually tight presentation that achieves what I think collections-based exhibitions ought to do: engage with familiar artworks in a manner that stimulates new understanding. The exhibition balances academic research and aesthetic experience, packaged in a seductive and meaningful environment. Admittedly, I previously held similar views with Sudjojono about Basoeki’s work as a kind of kitsch, but the show prompted me to critically re-examine Basoeki’s role as an artist. Ditzig’s curatorial focus is impactful because it responds to context on multiple layers: an Indonesian artist’s relationship with Singapore, its national collection, artistic agency, and sites of power, with National Gallery Singapore’s history as a former City Hall and Supreme Court. Rather than being bogged down by the weight of these contexts, the exhibition makes a confident statement about the complexity of Basoeki’s geopoetic activities. In turn, Ditzig also demonstrates how exhibitions of modern art can hold space for art history in a manner that is progressive in its outlook and considered in form.
Diplomacy and Desire: Basoeki Abdullah in Singapore, curated by Kathleen Ditzig, is on view from 9 May 2025 to 1 February 2026 at National Gallery Singapore.