Faris Nakamura

What Would Have Been - Reviving an Abandoned Past

Found Documents, Photographs

2016

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Istana Woodneuk is a dilapidated mansion that is well-hidden in a dense vegetation bounded within Holland Road and Tyersall road. With the death of its original owner, it was sold off and rebuilt to serve different purposes. Thereafter, the mansion was subjected to the Japanese bombing and finally ferociously engulfed by fire. Istana Woodneuk has definitely stood the test of time.

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"In 2015, I went to visit the mansion. It was exactly how it was described as in the articles i have read but what caught my attention were the untouched boxes of mirrors and tiles that were left there, as though somebody had plans to rebuild the mansion once more. I looked around and found floor plans with design ideas dating back to 2010. 

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With ignited excitement, I planned to revive Istana Woodneuk with the help of modern technology and use a 3-d software to render the designs presumably for the mansion into 3-d visual representations of what it would have looked like. I engaged an interior designer and an architect to decipher the designs and give an accurate readings but it wasn't an easy task. We needed more photographs of the mansion. To resolve this, I made plans for us to visit the mansion. 

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Unfortunately, in February 2016, it was announced by the police that Istana Woodneuk is off-limits and all trespassers will be arrested. Due to this, this project was brought to a halt . Just the found floor plans and the photographs I managed to take of the mansion were presented."

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This artwork was apart of the EPHEMERA held at The Substation, an exhibition about the 'bottomline' of art and creation - Ideas, And its presence, however ephemeral, sketchy, fragile, failed or incomplete.