Public Housing Flats at Commonwealth Avenue by Jeremy San — Large Scale Print
Completion: 1960s
Architect: Housing & Development Board
In response to the tropical climate and to keep building costs low, Housing and Development Board (HDB) devised long, narrow, multi-storey slab blocks, with single-loaded (or single-banked) access corridors. A building form that facilitates cross-ventilation and daylight penetration, each floor contains a line of apartment units, served by a common corridor to one side. The corridors remain open while providing some shade and shelter for the units.
On the façade, the continuous parapet walls of these corridors form alternating bands, an imageable and familiar sight today. The striking horizontal emphasis recalls the modernist feature of ribbon windows. In the block of Queenstown flats pictured, the corridor becomes, on the ground floor, a piloti-lined ‘five-foot-way’ serving shops. Above, projecting beams and notched sun-shading fins introduce visual rhythm to the continuous bands.
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Approximate Size: large scale 1 m x 3 m. Framed.
This is the original print that was exhibited at “Moderns in Our Midst: A Photographic Tribute to Singapore’s Modern Architectural Heritage” in 2015.
UV Printing on 3 mm white DIBOND with 10 mm square aluminium channel on 4 sides. Print does not feature the artist's signature. No other framing options available. No certificate of authenticity provided.
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A portion proceeds from Jeremy San's work will go to Singapore Heritage Society and Jeremy San's estate.
About Jeremy San
The late Jeremy San Tzer Ning was an accomplished architectural photographer based in Singapore, who documented local as well as regional architectural works in Malaysia, Hong Kong and China. Schooled in RMIT, Melbourne, Australia as an interior designer, his graduation thesis was an ambitious photo-documentation project of modern heritage buildings, which also spawned his photography career.
Upon graduation, Jeremy practised as an interior designer in the architecture office KNTA, and also collaborated with experimental design studios HAM Architects, LingHao Architects and AT Lab on various competition and proposals. His design training and practice experience gave him an empathetic eye as a photographer capturing architecture – whether historic, newly completed, or even under construction – as well as urban landscapes. He has been engaged by leading design firms including Alsop, Foster + Partners, Atelier Liu Yu Yang, K2LD, Formwerkz, KUU, Farm Works, UOL, DPA and ipli. His works are widely published, including in journals such as ish, Cubes, and SA. He was also commissioned by Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) to work on the Singapore 1:1 exhibitions (2005, 2007), and has collaborated with Studio Lapis on conservation documentation projects such as Victoria Theatre and Concert Hall. In 2012, he was awarded the Discernment Prize for the ICON de Martell Cordon Bleu photography awards.