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The Arts Intel Report

A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler
A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler

Kim Lim: The Space Between

Kim Lim, Irrawaddy, 1979.

Until Feb 2, 2025
1 St Andrew's Rd, Singapore 178957

The sculptor Kim Lim was born in Singapore in 1936, but left her home country at 17 to study art at London’s Central Saint Martins. It was a bold move. The British art world was riddled with systemic sexism and racism, and sculpture was considered a masculine discipline. When Lim graduated in the 1960s, she began creating wood structures, combining rhythmic forms and colors to create works that were influenced by nature, but were decidedly minimalist. She had always responded, she once said, “to things that were done in earlier civilizations that seemed to have less elaboration and more strength.” Lim died in 1997, at 61. Though she was a major postwar influence, her work is less known today. This is the first large survey of Lim’s work in her native country, and it brings much-deserved attention to an important artist. —Elena Clavarino

Photo courtesy of National Heritage Board, Singapore