Remnants of war transformed into instruments of healing in Temple, National Gallery Singapore’s first interactive sonic installation

Vietnamese-American artist Tuan Andrew Nguyen invites visitors to interact with and experience Temple’s percussive elements of healing, as part of the Gallery’s eighth Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Commission Series.

SINGAPORE, 23 October 2025 – National Gallery Singapore presents Temple by Tuan Andrew Nguyen, a multi-sensorial installation which fuses personal memory and material histories of the Vietnam War. Featuring percussive instruments crafted from defused unexploded ordnance (UXO) carefully removed from the landscape of Quảng Trị in central Vietnam, the installation invites visitors to strike the suspended shells, gongs, and chimes to generate a meditative soundscape.  

Temple is the Gallery’s first rooftop installation to integrate participative motion and sound. When struck, the percussive elements produce carefully tuned frequencies designed to complement one another. The MK82 bell, for instance, has been tuned to 432Hz – a frequency believed to be a 'universal frequency' of healing. Between 1963 and 1975, intensive bombing in Vietnam left over 1.5 million tonnes of UXO buried across the country. As visitors engage with Temple, they are invited to reflect on land, history and conflict. 

While Temple’s “day-glo safety orange” saturation recalls the American sculptor Alexander Calder’s modernist stabiles, it is also a colour commonly used to demarcate unsafe areas contaminated by UXO in Vietnam’s landscape. The installation’s sculptural form draws from the limestone hills surrounding Chùa Hương, known as the Perfume Pagoda, a historic Buddhist pilgrimage site between Hanoi and Huế where the artist's grandmother Ðặng Thị Lạc, a poet and former newspaper editor, once sought shelter. This interplay of form and colour underscores how Temple transforms remnants of conflict into tools connected to the possibility of healing and recuperation. 

Artist Tuan Andrew Nguyen says, “I am grateful for the opportunity to present Temple at National Gallery Singapore on the occasion of the 8th Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Commission. With this installation, I wanted to bring to light the effects and the surplus of UXO in Vietnam’s central region, specifically Quảng Trị, and how they continue to affect the community today. The residual effects of war carry on for several generations after wars end and I hope that through their interactions with Temple, visitors will pause to reflect and contemplate the great of potential of generating compassion, how ideas of reincarnation could open up space for empathy, and the healing possibilities generated through material transformation.”

Dr Seng Yu Jin, Project Director of Temple says, “As the leading institution for art in Southeast Asia, we are committed to presenting thoughtful experiences that invite audiences to reimagine the region and its art through new lenses in ways relevant to our contemporary socio-cultural and historical contexts. Working with contemporary artists like Tuan Andrew Nguyen enables our audiences to interact with the installation and engage with global issues, utilising art as a critical touchpoint for contemplation, reflection and the transformative power of art in envisioning a better future.”

In addition to visitors’ interactions with the percussive elements, water hyacinth mats are provided to encourage them to sit within the installation, complementing their experience with Temple’s meditative soundscape and creating space for moments of reflection.

Temple by Tuan Andrew Nguyen will be on display at the Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Gallery, Level 5, City Hall Wing at National Gallery Singapore from 25 October 2025 to 11 October 2026.

Admission is free. More information can be found on the Gallery’s website: https://www.nationalgallery.sg/sg/en/exhibitions/TEMPLE-by-Tuan-Andrew-Nguyen-.html.  

Temple is also presented as part of Singapore Biennale 2025: pure intention, alongside artworks by four other Biennale artists, sited across the Gallery. Singapore Biennale 2025 is commissioned by National Arts Council, Singapore and organised by Singapore Art Museum, and takes place from 31 October 2025 to 29 March 2026. For more information about Singapore Biennale, visit https://singaporebiennale.org/.

The Gallery’s Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden Commission series invites one leading artist each year to present site-specific works at the Gallery, with Temple being the eighth edition. Previous commissioned artists include Lisa Reihana, Cao Fei, Sir Antony Gormley, Shilpa Gupta, Rirkrit Tiravanija and Danh Võ. The series is made possible through a generous gift from Far East Organization.

Media assets are available through this link. 

• Annex A: Biography of Tuan Andrew Nguyen  

• Annex B: Temple Programmes