Events

Wang, clutching a Hong Kong protest umbrella and visibly in tears, stabs at invisible enemies to the soaring chorus of “Girl on Fire”. The emotional impact was overwhelming—the audience rose to their feet in a standing ovation and brought the artist back for five curtain calls.

— Alexey Markin, DRAPO LAVE (translated from Russian)

Why is a Taiwanese military reservist so fascinated by Alicia Keys’ chart-topping hit “Girl on Fire”—a gay anthem he has sung countless times in karaoke bars? As he launches into the song’s climax, he is struck by a disorienting realisation: He can no longer place himself in the timeline of his own life when this transformative song was released on 4 September 2012.

A fanatical search through his digital archives unearths fragments of memory and confronts him with a past haunted by violence and destruction. In a live performance that assembles a visual monument entirely from memory, Wang wrestles with the fragility of memory—and the unsettling reality that everything he has preserved could go up in flames in an instant, consumed by forces beyond his control.

If autofobio (autobiographical phobia) were a genre, Retina Manoeuvre would be its textbook example. Here, theatre becomes a near-ritualistic medium for sweating out personal catharsis in front of a community—a warning to all.

— Wouter Hillaert, pzazz (translated from Dutch)

There will be a dialogue with the artists after the 8pm performance on 16 January 2026, with speech to text interpretation available upon request. Please email your request to info@singaporefringe.com by 5 December 2025.

Artist Statement

The core topics of Retina Manoeuvre revolve around questioning the meaning of war, national ideology, violence, and geopolitical conflict. At its heart, the work presents a clear statement: there should be no justification or meaning for any form of violence. However, the production deliberately takes a complex, unconventional approach, leading the audience to connect with me—a flawed, ordinary, middle-class queer individual whose body was trained for combat during military service a decade ago and can be reactivated to kill on the battlefield whenever called upon by the nation.

This tension between an anti-violence mindset and a body conditioned as a reservist soldier is so deeply paradoxical and unresolved that it renders offering any definitive solutions or answers meaningless. Yet, it is this very lack of resolution that gives the work its significance.