Deluge of boundary-pushing acts

IF ONE had just two words to describe the second edition of the Singapore International Festival of Arts (SIFA) under the direction of avant garde theatre director Ong Keng Sen, those words would be "mad ambition"; if one word, then just "mad".

SIFA 2015 was a massive seven- week festival with a couple of mini-festivals tucked into it. Last year's edition had 16 shows; this year, there were 66 - yes, 66. Of these, though, 25 were no-budget 45- minute plays in people's homes playing to an audience of no more than 15 each time. With more than three times as many titles this year, the festival clocked a total attendance figure (correct at press time) of 62,000 - up from last year's 22,000. Gross ticket sales stayed the same as the 2014 edition at 86 per cent.

The main festival had big Singapore stars such as Ivan Heng, Glen Goei, T'ang Quartet, Alfian Sa'at, Natalie Hennedige, Santha Bhaskar, Goh Lay Kuan and Kok Heng Leun - all coming together to create works that variously reflected on or celebrated Singapore's 50th year. Festival director Ong had asked them to create works with absolutely no inhibition in terms of ideas and logistics. They came back to him with some zany - and absolutely amazing - ideas.