At first glance, the works of Singaporean artist Qixuan Lim have a familiar, edible appearance.
However, upon closer look at a sardine tin, it is found to be packed with tiny human hearts, and cherubic arms and legs or other human body parts made of clay.
“I think my art has always been about that combination of things that people find sort of traditionally, typically cute, but having a darker twist and a darker element to it,” said Lim, who is known by her social media accounts and by her fans as QimmyShimmy.
Photo: Reuters
“There are still a lot of aesthetics and ideas of beauty that are tied onto our perceptions of what is beauty,” she said.
The 28-year old studied in the Netherlands is now a full-time information designer.
She first showed her works in 2017, while still a student. Since then, her Instagram account, where she posts pictures of her art, has attracted a following of more than 100,000.
Now back in Singapore, Lim described herself as a part-time artist. She has no studio and creates most of her works in her bedroom. She uses the oven in the kitchen as a kiln.
Despite her modest production facilities, her macabre works are continuing to attract fans and she recently exhibited her creations at a gallery in Japan, where “creepy-cute” is a trend in pop culture.
“This work is free from stereotypes,” gallery visitor Mako Kudo said. “It gives us new perspective, which is different from what we see usually.”
The exhibition in Tokyo, called “Modern Panic,” featured a series of sushi rolls filled with baby heads and nigiri topped with eyeballs and brains.
Thousands gathered across New Zealand yesterday to celebrate the signing of the country’s founding document and some called for an end to government policies that critics say erode the rights promised to the indigenous Maori population. As the sun rose on the dawn service at Waitangi where the Treaty of Waitangi was first signed between the British Crown and Maori chiefs in 1840, some community leaders called on the government to honor promises made 185 years ago. The call was repeated at peaceful rallies that drew several hundred people later in the day. “This government is attacking tangata whenua [indigenous people] on all
RIGHTS FEARS: A protester said Beijing would use the embassy to catch and send Hong Kongers to China, while a lawmaker said Chinese agents had threatened Britons Hundreds of demonstrators on Saturday protested at a site earmarked for Beijing’s controversial new embassy in London over human rights and security concerns. The new embassy — if approved by the British government — would be the “biggest Chinese embassy in Europe,” one lawmaker said earlier. Protester Iona Boswell, a 40-year-old social worker, said there was “no need for a mega embassy here” and that she believed it would be used to facilitate the “harassment of dissidents.” China has for several years been trying to relocate its embassy, currently in the British capital’s upmarket Marylebone district, to the sprawling historic site in the
A deluge of disinformation about a virus called hMPV is stoking anti-China sentiment across Asia and spurring unfounded concerns of renewed lockdowns, despite experts dismissing comparisons with the COVID-19 pandemic five years ago. Agence France-Presse’s fact-checkers have debunked a slew of social media posts about the usually non-fatal respiratory disease human metapneumovirus after cases rose in China. Many of these posts claimed that people were dying and that a national emergency had been declared. Garnering tens of thousands of views, some posts recycled old footage from China’s draconian lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic, which originated in the country in late
BACK TO BATTLE: North Korean soldiers have returned to the front lines in Russia’s Kursk region after earlier reports that Moscow had withdrawn them following heavy losses Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday pored over a once-classified map of vast deposits of rare earths and other critical minerals as part of a push to appeal to US President Donald Trump’s penchant for a deal. The US president, whose administration is pressing for a rapid end to Ukraine’s war with Russia, on Monday said he wanted Ukraine to supply the US with rare earths and other minerals in return for financially supporting its war effort. “If we are talking about a deal, then let’s do a deal, we are only for it,” Zelenskiy said, emphasizing Ukraine’s need for security guarantees