Category Archives: Research

New World’s End Reflection

Leave a reply

The New World’s End is a permanent installation in OH! Open House which provides a multi sensory theatrical experience. It tells a love story of Kiran and Rosa, while presenting the history and stories of Jalan Besar such as the mentioning of iconic New World Amusement Park in the 1960s and exploring the theatrical sets and installations during the walk. It was my first ever audio guided walk and I had not explore much of Jalan Besar before so it was new and interesting experience. To be able to have both takes on how Jalan Besar was, from hearing it’s past through the eyes of the couple and seeing how Jalan Besar is presently.

We started the introduction at the OH! Open House at Desker Road and heading out exploring Jalan Besar. The timing of the tour fits with the tour. As it was during night time, especially the section “The streets of Jalan Besar”, it was accompanies by real time sounds of Jalan Besar, the bustling of the streets of people walking and cars driving around. However this provided slight collision of sounds at sections such as “The Night Style” where the couple were together having a conversation, creating a romantic, peaceful quiet like atmosphere.

An aspect I have noticed of an audio guided tour was how the audio can be received along with the route we were to take. There were times we had trouble keeping up with the audio or listening to it whilst taking note of our surroundings in hopes to find our way along the guided route and also not get in anyone’s way. I felt I would have been lost if not accompanied by my classmates. This in my opinion breaks the immersive experience the audio perhaps intends to give but also giving a difference experience with the surrounding sound, space and environment as mentioned before on the sections. The map in the ticket also was a great help, showing noticeable landmarks such as the Mustafa Centre, Fortuna Hotel and the 24 Hour Coffee Shop Al Mubin, it works well with the audio which also mentions the landmarks, and with the audio track number marked on the map as well to keep track.

For the theatrical sets, such as the apartment and dressing room had such great attention to detail. From the cigarette butts on placed in the ash tray, the drinks, papers and stationary scattered around, to Kiran’s typewriter half typed. The setting of the space also fit with the time period. It gave the impression as if someone really lived there and I felt slight bad for intruding their home. We also noticed the apartment on the other side of the window was lit and wondered in it was part of the set. The set portraying the collapse of the Hotel New World showed the devastation and also the memories of the couple. The staff had to close the entrance so the set was pitch black and flashing of lights and it terrified me, fitting with the collapsing of the hotel, but with the black and white screens showing the couple, it created this flashback calm effect as we focused on what was on the screens.

 The New World’s End overall was an immersive experience and it showed me the possible interactions be it controlled and uncontrolled through an audio guided tour we may encounter.

(563 words)

FURTHER REFERENCES
https://ohopenhouse.org/OH-Stories-New-World-s-End
https://sgmagazine.com/things-to-do-singapore/news/oh-open-house-new-worlds-end
https://www.timeout.com/singapore/art/new-worlds-end

Possible questions to ask:
>How was the guided route designed or planned out?
> With the experience enhanced with music duo NADA, and films by Brian Gothong Tan. Were some of the works pre-existing or made specially for New World’s End?