FEEDfragileBACK (pronounced Feedback Fragile) encompasses at once both the tense, evolving relationships that characterise the residents of Singapore’s waterways, and the fragility of the relationships that hold them together — ranging from one’s apathy to their pets, leading owners towards careless releases; to society-wide neglect of trash, leading to careless littering into waterways. These actions lead to and cause runaway processes — feedback loops of negligence that mutate originally natural behaviours of feeding into destructive forces, altogther accelerating pressures on already fragile environments.

At the same time, with this lack of awareness, feedback — in its form as reaction — is what Nathan seeks to extract from viewers on these hidden realities, as they gain new perspectives from FEEDfragileBACK’s multiple narrators. In a meta turn, Nathan’s own medium of printmaking — Itself an artform with inevitable imperfections during transfer — serves as apt metaphor for these fragilities, as he examines them with subtle blue-on-blue explorations. Finally, the exhibition’s disjointed title reflects the absurdity inherent in these situations: just like the randomness of the objects Nathan first found downstream.

The exhibition hopes to illuminate visitors to new possibilities in printmaking as an art form, as well as inform the public on the importance of environmental awareness and responsibility, as the variety of FEEDfragileBACK’s works illustrates urgent realities hidden in plain sight.