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ARTS&LEISURE
182
April15
1
These are exciting times for Brazilian artist PATRICIA CABALEIRO
and her Wessex Estate studio and art school, Cabaleiro Atelier & Art
School. Ten of her students – they rather stylishly call themselves
the Apprentices @ Cabaleiro – have for the first time been accepted
as participants in this month’s spring edition of the Affordable Art
Fair (AAF), taking place from 17 to 19 April at the F1 Pit Building.
H
aving been involved since the
very first AAF was held six
years ago, Patricia has seen
this popular event develop
and improve greatly over the years. “Our
work is contemporary in style and the
standard is good,” she explains, “and
so I feel we have something to offer that
is different from the other exhibitors.”
This is the first time she has thought
of exhibiting her students’ work for sale
in this way, though they’re planning an
exhibition at the Brazilian Embassy later
this year, in September. In fact, Patricia
doesn’t think that anything quite like
this has been done in Singapore before
The Apprentices are ten of Patricia’s
students who have worked with her for
at least three years – some for as long
as five or six years. “Some of them were
not easy to convince,” she says, “and
that’s because showing your artwork
can be frightening and can make you
feel incredibly vulnerable.”
In order to be accepted for the
AAF, she explains, you have to send
photographs of your artwork to the AAF
committee, which then decides whether
or not the standard is acceptable.
Patricia curated her studio’s application
from the five to 10 artworks that she’d
asked each student to put forward,
choosing what she considered to be
the best two. What’s more, she asked
the committee to consider the ten
students’ works as a total entity and to
either accept or reject it as such. This
“all or nothing” approach paid off when
the answer came back positive.
Patricia is touched and delighted by
the way the diverse group – representing
Art to the Power of
10
seven different nationalities and ranging
in age from their 30s to their 60s – have
risen to the occasion. A huge amount
of work goes into a show like this,
she explains, and the administration
can be a nightmare, but they have
wholeheartedly taken it on as a team.
What’s more, says Patricia with a wry
smile, she herself is eventually learning
to delegate!
“It’s super to see them all cooperating
as a brilliant team. One of them is doing
a spreadsheet of the artwork; several
of them are focusing on compiling a
marketing database of designers and
interior designers; another is doing
the Facebook page, and so on. We’re
communicating via our own WhatsApp
group and we’re using Google Drive;
everyone is learning fromeveryone else.”
There’s no hand-holding in her studio,
Patricia reveals; and, she adds, her art
classes are not always fun. “I don’t teach;
I like to say that I guide. My students
struggle a lot: they have to find their
own answers and learn through their
mistakes.”
There are four artworks from each
Apprentice, of which two will be shown
at a time. Each measuring 76cm x 76cm,
they will be displayed in a grid; pricing
is uniform, too, at $560 each. What’s
more, all the works were inspired by
a common theme – My Singapore. As
Patricia explains, Singapore is the one
thing that her diverse students do have
in common.
Should you like a par ticular
Apprentice’s style or subject matter,
she says, they are open to accepting
commissions for a particular size or
colour-way.
Top row (L
to R): Nishta
Sipahimalan,
Montse Oliver,
Marleen Aldorf,
Vibecke Paulsen
Lovik and
Megha Nema
Bottom row (L
to R): Rosie
Oliveira,
Inken Von Der
Luehe, Patricia
Cabaleiro, Shruti
Gupta and
Gillian Duncan
By Verne Maree; photo by Ken Tan