graffiti galore at old changi hospital

the abandoned buildings of the old changi hospital attract a host of people with different interests and inclinations. school children find the space on the walls an inviting medium to express their thoughts and feelings or to give vent to their frustrations. the graffiti vandals seem to have a field day at this site. nevetheless, there are some pieces that can qualify as graffiti art, like the 'street dance' ad the 'crab' above.

another group of people who haunt this place are the ghost hunters. you can see evidence of their having been there in almost every corner of the buildings. there are joss sticks stuck into cracks or where power-point plugs used to be. there were even joss papers scattered on the floor. on the top level, some occult group has been there to practise their cult. i suppose these groups of people are active only at night.

then there are the scrap metal hunters and karung guni men. it seems it is not just metal they are after. anything that is of use and value does not stand a chance against these raiders. the fire hose from the reel was not spared. someone tired unsuccessfully to remove a rectangular metal box fixed to the wall. my friend thought it could be a safe.

evidence that it was a former hospital can be obtained from some of the documents strewn on the floor. somebody must have ransacked the cupboards and drawers in the hope of finding something valuable and he must have chucked the valueless old documents on the floor.

built in 1930, it was meant to be a strategic military location in the east of singapore. from the building, you get a good view of the sea to the north and east of singapore. after the british moved out, it was turned into a public hospital but one of the higher levels was reserved for army personnels.

graffiti - is it a form of art?

i was walking alongside the canal behind chestnut avenue when i saw some graffiti on the walls of the canal. they look like the work of some youths who had too much time on their hands. this reminds me of the graffiti that i came across when i travelled by train in melbourne.

my initial impression of graffiti was that it was some scribblings by gang members who were out to mark their territory or some rebellious youths' way of self-expression. i think graffiti started as a form of vandalism - unsolicited marking of a private or public property. in fact, they first started appearing on the trains in new york city.


a piece of graffiti art from melbourne

however, after viewing some of the pieces in melbourne, my perception of it has changed. i would say that graffiti has evolved into a form of art. i am not referring to the graffiti that you find in some of our public and coffee shop toilets. those telephone numbers and crude and suggestive drawings cannot qualify as art.

the complexity and size of some of the graffiti on the walls of buildings near the railway stations suggest that these pieces were not the work of one individual but more like the combined effort of a group of graffiti artists.

there appears to be a standard way in which the graffiti artists form the letters, though sometimes reading the calligraphy may need a bit of deciphering. the mutlicolour works which they produce exhibit creativity and vibrancy and have an aesthetic appeal of their own.