miniroomRealRoom
Emil Goh (b.1966, Malaysia) passed away on Monday 7 September in Seoul. It’s taken us a bit of time to come to terms with the shock of it, something that seems so impossible. Emil as a person was so ever-present, so tapped into life and people and stuff. Even if he only appeared in my life intermittently, on trips home to see his family, I could always be sure that he was working away at something fun, making things happen. It’s hard to imagine him as being truly absent. I think everyone who knew Emil loved him in some way, and Emil knew an awful lot of people.
We first met in London in the late 90s when he was doing his Masters at Goldsmith’s – I’m quite sure it was in a Tube station going off to meet Wong Hoy Cheong who was doing a residency there. I’d go see Emil in his digs off Russell Square and literally every single person we passed in a square kilometre radius would greet us with a “Hi, Emil!” Things weren’t so different when I visited him in Sydney. He loved putting together ideas and people, and he was a beacon to me in many ways through his friendship, and his work. He never stayed still for very long though. I wish I could have visited him in Seoul, where he seemed to have found a place he found interesting enough to settle in for a while.
I fell in love with the video “Between” he made which spanned a day in London through a series of friends’ apartments using a camera on a lazy susan. Up until then I’d never really “got” video as a medium. I thought his 30-second video of a cellphone vibrating on a table was pure genius. He made a sort of poetry out of the little resonances in the tiniest things we overlook everyday – couples dressed like one another, stall vendors making fruit ices, the lights in tall buildings at night. Every time I see two cars of the same make and colour following each other on the road I think of his work and it helps me to smile through the KL traffic. I think he was particularly special, and perhaps almost renegade as an artist in that his work has been about the personal – our personal, not his in particular, without the need for overriding narratives. He didn’t need a big name in lights, influence or money to be generous. In his public projects, he showed us how little things could make the world a slightly better place – ‘handyhold’ hooks along a street to hang heavy shopping bags, cushions embroidered with cellphone numbers to facilitate double parking. He designed “umbrella taxis” to take us across the road in the rain. I think, in the wake of losing Emil, many of us could do with one of those umbrellas right now.
(BY)
Our thoughts and deepest condolences go to Emil’s family and friends around the world.
On 30th September we will be hosting an evening at 19 Jalan Berangan to remember Emil, with his family and friends. Details will follow shortly.