Marcos Kueh

What is it about the sound of waterfalls that paints the imagination of the overworked hustler who grew up in the city? What is it about the idea of living in a penthouse that strikes a chord of the heartstrings of the jungle dwellers living below the poverty line? Once I was told to look deeply into the mycelium of a mushroom and meditate on it. For a split second, I could see the universe – I saw how we are all interconnected as one, how we all go through cycles of life and death, how naturally our bodies and lives destruct and rejuvenate as an integral part of growth. The next second, I saw my personal yacht floating in Santorini when I manage to save the world and earn big bucks by campaigning my new age religion and market my mycelium might pills. Sometimes it is scary what I am willing to do to shed this skin of poverty and shame, to devolve into a disgusting city dweller, to ascend into a higher state of capitalistic conscious – I don’t need all this suffering and mundane rituals to restraint what I truly desire. We can exchange our devotions, you take my place and be the enlightened one, and I can head to the capital to be the other one.

My whole childhood, looking at the pair of tigers on my national emblem, the iconography that supposedly unifies and represents our values and identity as Malaysians, I naturally assumed that there would be tigers in the rainforests of Borneo too. They told us not to head into the rainforests because the tigers might devour you, but what is scarier, I think is the death of trust and belonging when you find out that your identity is actually just a myth, and the fictional, dangerous predator in the jungle had been, all along keeping us in our own bubble of reality in the guise of safety. I wonder how many of us are sitting still, petrified to head out into the wilds, because we believed in false values. I wonder, as a person from the east, how many of us are still in the rainforest desperately searching for tigers, trying so hard to believe that the Malayan tiger is not exclusive only to the west.

Malaysia is composed of two non-contiguous regions: West Malaysia which is on the Malay Peninsula, and East Malaysia, which is on the island of Borneo. The Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur and the administrative center, Putrajaya are both located in the West. The highly profitable activities of tourism, timber extraction and petroleum industry are mainly situated in the East. The national flower of Malaysia is the Hibiscus rosa-sinensis. The red of the petals symbolizes the courage, life, and rapid growth of the Malaysian people, and the five petals represent the five Rukun Negara of Malaysia. The tourism trap of Sarawak is the parasitic Rafflesia Arnoldi. The red petals are seductive icons for tourists seeking for an exotic adventure in the tropical rainforest through pre-paid package deals; the five petals smell like rotting meat because the main pollinators of the flower are flies.

There are only a few profound moments in my life so far. One was at 19 when was made to believe, for the first time, that I was enough. Since then life has become a devotion to understand and work for pride, to follow the voices so strong and clear - often I forget to eat, some nights I cannot sleep and hard work has become my friend. I see it sometimes, in the eyes of others, in fleeting moments when they are in tuned with the same sublime frequency and they can see what I see. They tell me that they are proud and I am proud too. As the work becomes bigger and bigger, I feel smaller and smaller. Eventually I will also be gone, I will burn and melt and disintegrate ; Just like every devoted weaver in Borneo who goes blind and develop back problems because we hear callings, we pay the price in evoking the sublime, in working for the arts. In the end only the work remains. I am ok to go.

In the textile installation 福禄寿: Three Contemporary Prosperities, we encounter an animated conversation of color, pattern, and symbol. The installation encompasses eight tapestries of varying sizes, carefully arranged by the artist to afford a view of both the front and reverse sides. Kueh encourages us to move between perspectives on observing, to create multiple encounters while we meditate on the meaning of “prosperity” in modern times. Kueh’s study of prosperity is driven by an urge to deepen his understanding of his Chinese-Malaysian cultural background. He has become fascinated with the three popular Chinese gods of fortune: the Fú Lù Shòu (福禄寿). Each of these three gods embodies a different form of fortune. Fú (福) stands for prosperity or wealth; Lù (禄) for reputation or nobility, and Shòu (寿) for longevity or eternity. Kueh weaves these attributes into his works through written text, Chinese characters and symbols that refer to the excessive accumulation of wealth and influence by companies like Amazon and Facebook. Under these circumstances – what does it mean to wish someone wealth, reputation, and eternal life in today’s world? Kueh takes a critical look at these blessings by depicting Fú as a millionaire, Lù as a social influencer, and Shòu as a post-human cyborg. As we continue our exploration of “prosperity” in the contemporary, we encounter a four-meter-long tapestry depicting the most supreme deity of the Chinese pantheon: the Jade Emperor (玉皇大帝, Yù Huáng Dà Dì). Here, we as viewers literally sit at the feet of this great emperor and, as the title suggests, Under God’s Eye places us right beneath his gaze. Kueh deliberately shows only the back side of the work, where the colors are decidedly more muted and the weave threads more fluid and painterly. In this tapestry the reverse side is especially less illustrative – becoming a scene where Kueh erodes the material notion of prosperity in pursuit of the spiritual.

We are all hungry beings. With so much truth already in the world we still need more. The more “truths” we make up, the more truths we forget. more education for more opportunities, more gym for more health, more followers for more influence, more travel plans so I can run, run away from these yucky feelings we still cannot describe - we just need more words to describe our emotions and then we will be safe. “You are not you when you are hungry” says the American SNICKERS chocolate bar advertisement. But you have always only been hungry. You have always only been devouring. You are an enlightened man, they are the jungle men. In between us is the believe of science or ghosts.

<<游子吟>>

慈母手中线，游子身上衣。 临行密密缝，意恐迟迟归。 谁言寸草心，报得三春晖。
 
<<Wander’s hum>>

Thread in loving Mother’s hands, clothes for her wandering child; Sewn tight so that it lasts, 
in case the journey ahead gets long; How can a young heart,

as tender as fresh new grass, make up for mother’s benevolent love as three seasons of spring sunshine.

Even when I was in your belly, you whispered hopes for me to be your pride and joy; I have heard every prayer of yours, for me to be that brilliant son. The moment they cut off the umbilical cord that tied me to you, our heartbeats lost sync. And underneath the weight of expectations, the screeching sound of my first cry was the only response I could give. Some nights I stay up late, thinking of the many ways we tried to meet each other in the middle, because the line of agreement is for me to be brilliant and you to be proud, while I grief over parallel lives we could have had outside of the middle. In honour of the suffering of our tradition, in honour of the legacy of our bloodline, we tolerate each other and stay still. At the end of the road, I will whisper apologies into your urn; and I hope you hear it from the other side of how you would have been a brilliant grandmother to the son I will never have. Because my heart in this mortal body is not a vessel that can hold on to your tears – it is only filled with fears. I will be the one crying here while you stay dry as a powder, and that is the only love I can give, at the end of the road.

We were driving by acres of palm oil plantations in Malaysia when Kevin first mentioned about the story of the red monkey. Instead of poisoning and shooting invading monkeys, there is a hearsay going around the durian and palm oil plantations that farmers are trapping monkeys for torture. The tormented monkeys are then marked red before getting released back into the wild. When the red monkey returns to it’s community, it will be seen as a mutant and scares off the other monkeys from returning to the estate. The story itself is a very loaded one: it reminded me both of how my dad used to tell me that if I was naughty, I would be caught by the boogyman as a practice of discipline and Kevin’s other story of how his great grandfather was captured by the Japanese occupation and tortured for information. The only difference of course is that when Kevin’s great grandfather returned to his village, he was celebrated as a hero for enduring torture and not disclosing the location of the village while the red monkey (supposedly) gets rejected by its community as an oddity and dies alone. When you look into the perspectives of each character at play - the plantation worker, the red monkey and the monkey’s community, you slowly realize that truths are almost always so personal and insecure. It is said that the idea of disgust is a biological trait that keeps us far from danger - rotting meat, sickness, homelessness, inferiority, the poor. As the world becomes less safe, more and more mutated red monkeys seem to appear in the jungle. Maybe one day, you too will forget that you actually loved durians.

In the morning she scrubs, with nimble hands the toilet bowl she rubs. Day job cleaner lady, it’s just her warm up, because after hours she grinds, midnight at the nightclub. The thrill of power gets her riled up, Nimble hands, she really knows how to rub. Growing up small, she always wanted to feel grown up, businessmen mentors, she keeps them close, gets them worked up. ~ Contemporary myths, we’re all villains, truly sincerely - Look in the mirror, look at who we are clearly. Because we were told that we are shamefully ugly, our egos we like to beat up, severely in eternity. Maybe we need to love ourselves really more deeply, kindness against evil even if we have to embrace it insecurely.

Money minded, he’s too blinded, Making capitals because we’re so close minded. Today Amsterdam tomorrow New York, Maybe next month we’re opening for Björk. All we want like The States and Europe, To take over the world, from Borneo the groundwork. One day you’ll see us in our glory and despair, even the Kardashians would have to tune in, stay aware.

Land of Hornbills, we all pay bills. Our magical skill, is to provide economical thrills. All this for our egos ideal, is there more to that we can appeal?

Our heritage is more than just staged, although in the social tier, we might not be first page. Hailing from the forests, we are all brave, later on told by the world to behave; Maybe we deserve more than just being slaves, from here we start realigning our brainwaves.

Contamination of nations, devoted duties, missionaries coming over in the name of pity. Mother Mary the new diety, here to clean up all that is dirty. One last question to clear up anxiety, to whom this time is her victim of piety.

Exotic help, fantastic, domestic, heard that she was a past mystic. One day her cleaning bucket will be the only bleak relic. Unpolished fate, trapped economic. She was never meant to be that pathetic.

Looking for teacher, turn to nature, make sure you know this rule before you mature. When the forest speak, listen up and stop critic, from the squeaks to the shrieks, maybe they're telling me to fast for two weeks? Seven omen birds, from afar they still preach, an indigenious form of complicated speech. But really there is so much to teach, past knowledge, can we still try to reach?

When she felt small, her mother would call, to remind her she was one with beings of the waterfall. One day, glass beads will fall, flooding even the tallest of dam walls. Eternally in the Sarawak river they continue to roll, and we will learn to stand tall, instead of crawl.

Berjalai is an ancient concept by the Iban tribe of Borneo which asks young men to venture and wander into the vast unknown outside of the village on their own epic journey to find wisdom and their own footing in discomfort before returning home as an actual adult. A meaningful representation of this personal expedition is the concept of Alpinism, the art of confronting the most significant dangers with greatest prudence through climbing mountains, first coined by René Daumal in his novel Mount Analogue. So, what’s the point of climbing up summits when we all need to come down again? Only this, Daumal writes: “what is above knows what is below, what is below does not know what is above.” It is precisely this gift of perspective – a gift that, once granted, cannot easily be revoked, that we depart on this long journey to understand independence. To learn the language of our colonisers, read books written of our past, confront our self-esteem, ask hard questions, learn to think for ourselves, and ultimately earn our own liberation free from the shackles of our inherited trauma. “One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is an art of conducting oneself in the lower regions by the memory of what one saw higher up. When one can no longer see, one can at least still know.” Daumal

Am I exotic because I am exotic? Am I exotic because they want me to be exotic? This strong urge to get down on my knees, maybe it is because I am confused and like to please. Balancing on a tightrope between “Malaysia’s exotic unknown” and “the developing country with third world mentality”; between the inner savage and the aspiring Englishman is the tension point where the discourse of Kenyalang Circus is placed. Translated as “Hornbill Circus” from Sarawak Malay, the project is expressed in a series of giant slow crafted woven posters, playing with the idea of sensational advertising in the context of the laborious nature of the third world. Ultimately, Kenyalang Circus is a contemplation of the self-esteem and the contradicting pride of the exotic humans of the rainforests. A creative attempt to deconstruct, untangle and re-fabricate the many layers of complications, interwoven into the third world’s perception of the self; a chance at having a say on our misunderstood compliance. The reclamation and recognition of our identities will be a grand and entertaining one for you to bear witness.

Malaysian Chinese born in Borneo, my own culture only in photos; Many identities we tend to outgrow, trapped in foreign museums our artifacts galore. Today in Amsterdam, tomorrow in Moscow, the Kenyalang Circus is making its rollcall. The world is watching, entertainment for the soul, gaze upon our suffering, redefining myths, that’s the goal.

Royal nectar hard to despise, beautiful culture only for your eyes. Stinky habits hard to exorcise, under the gaze of tourists, just as advertised. Sometimes we like to self chastise, making ourselves small, a primitive high. That my friend is the story I stylize, the exotic art of blooming for flies.