Online
Niceaunties
Auntieverse
Feb 5 - 8, 2024
Overview
“Auntieverse is a world where care, critique, and cultural memory coexist—where aunties, often dismissed in everyday life, become central figures navigating the absurdities of ageing, labour, and environment through speculative futures.“
- Niceaunties
Details
The Auntieverse is an imaginary parallel universe filled with aunties living alongside fantastical creatures made of plastic and trash. It’s a whimsical world where recurring characters like the Frog Assistant and Cat make appearances in both images and video narratives. In this universe, aunties run wild with imagination, unbound by rules, regulations, or the typical laws of physics. It’s an ever-expanding cosmos filled with cities, adventures, subplots, and environments that often mirror our real world—though with alternate endings and a light-hearted perspective.
At the start of the project, the Auntieverse revolved around aunties meeting in an interstellar “Club 33,” where they shared stories of their adventures. As the project evolved, the visuals and narratives began to be told directly from the aunties’ point of view, expanding into themes like social and community dynamics, beauty, body image, and puns (TESLA, NASA, etc.), as well as environmental issues, fashion, and even esoteric topics like jellies, energy, and planetary alignment.
The Auntieverse has grown organically, reflecting my own views and forming new opinions along the way. It holds the potential to be a forever project, given its limitless scope and inspiration drawn from the real world. Everyday life, history, pop culture, current events—all these elements can be magnified and transformed into uplifting tales within the Auntieverse.
Chapter 1 Auntiecity
'The Auntie City' depicts everyday life in the Auntieverse, a world both run and built by aunties.
This world blends the ordinary with the extraordinary, filled with things aunties enjoy. The scenes include living quarters fashioned from stacks of Tupperware, sushi, and vegetables, alongside a vibrant depiction of city life viewed through building cross-sections. Here, both solitary aunties and groups interact with various creatures and city elements, walking around, socialising, and observing the hustle and bustle.
The concept of 'The Auntie City' draws inspiration from the 'walking city' idea by the 1960s British avant-garde architecture group Archigram. This concept envisaged a city capable of moving across land and water to utilise different resources and adapt to changing needs. In Auntieverse, this idea is manifested through buildings equipped with legs, making them mobile and adaptable. Aunties in this world creatively envision cascading pools in mid-air, playgrounds, and connecting bridges in the midst of high-rise apartment blocks. The use of Tupperware in this segment symbolises both the pervasive nature of plastics in our lives and the fear of ageing and societal isolation.
Chapter 2 Spa Menu
'Spa Menu' is a continual exploration of themes revolving around beauty, skin, and youth.
Set in Auntie’s Beauty Spa, this chapter showcases a realm of intense beauty treatments, including acupuncture and body wraps using fresh ingredients. Here, aunties are depicted enduring various beauty sessions, often maintaining a smile through the process.
Portraits of aunties receiving facial treatments feature a mix of different elements – parts of creatures, ingredients, objects, and needles – adorning their faces. Tiny construction workers and machines are also depicted busily at work on their visages. These images symbolise the discomfort and effort women endure to conform to societal standards of youth and beauty. The level of alteration and treatment they undergo is likened to a mini construction site, highlighting the extensive and often painful lengths undertaken in the pursuit of these ideals.
Chapter 3 Factory
A factory where aunties produce giant sushi rolls for various purposes other than eating. The imagery captures the social life of the aunties within the factory and the complex network of sushi production belts.
The concept of sushi, typically associated with freshness, being produced in a factory setting, creates a sense of discomfort and 'wrongness'. This chapter in the Auntieverse shows the factory's integration into the urban landscape and its internal environment. Inside, aunties are seen socialising in the canteen, relaxing in large ramen bowls, participating in group yoga sessions, or moving around the facility on giant sushi rolls. These scenes reveal the day-to-day life in 'Auntie’s Factory', adding another layer to the Auntieverse.
Chapter 4 Auntique
The Auntique chapter of Auntieverse features portraits of aunties engaged in various activities and settings, captured in black and white vintage visuals. Each image highlights an auntie proudly sporting a large, sculptural hairdo.
There seems to be no concern for impracticality or absurdity in these styles. This chapter is an exploration of the impact of hairdos, focusing on their scales and shapes. It pays tribute to the attention and care Asian aunties devote to their perms, whether to cover bald spots or to reflect their significant presence and personalities.
It serves as a commentary on the ultimate self expression of beauty and style.
Chapter 5 Auntiesocial
The ‘auntiesocial’ chapter celebrates community and sisterhood.
They can be seen participating in fun tour groups, making quirky dramatic expressions together, dancing, partying, wading through dreamscapes, cooking and sharing meals, posing together under the full moon, and even donning mermaid tails. It pays tribute to my mother's active lifestyle, which contrasts with her mother's more sedentary existence.
Chapter 6 Fashion
The fashion chapter of Auntieverse features everyday objects and cooking ingredients on the fashion runway, a stage typically reserved for the young, beautiful, and perfect fashion designs.
Aunties' fashion philosophy is to showcase the things they take pride in, such as daily household tasks like laundry, cleaning, and cooking.
This chapter highlights the textures of vegetables, appliances, and food, while also questioning the ideal body image through playful scaling and quantities of body parts.
Chapter 7 TESLA
The Tofu Engineered Sushi Luxury Autos, known as TESLA, is a concept in Auntieverse where vehicles are constructed entirely from biodegradable and edible materials.
In this chapter, we find images of a manufacturing plant where groups of aunties assemble vehicles using tofu, sushi ingredients, and legs to create modes of transportation. On the highways of Auntieverse, we see a variety of vehicles resembling coaches, construction cranes, tractors, and smaller automobiles, all driven by cheerful aunties and accompanied by whimsical creatures. The chapter also includes scenes of car washes and a scrapyard, providing a comprehensive view of this unique world. It is worth noting that in the Hokkien dialect, the word for "car" sounds similar to "leg," leading to a common pun among Singaporeans who humorously claim to own "cars," signifying their reliance on their own legs for transportation.
Chapter 8 IKEA
I.K.E.A. in the Auntieverse, stands for "Interstellar Kawaii Environment for Aunties." It represents a unique furniture showroom planet where only customized interior designs and fittings are available, and modular products are nowhere to be found.
I.K.E.A. offers a wide range of vibrant colors and unconventional interior spaces. Aunties inhabit and interact with spaces that include creatures, wine, ramps, playrooms, indoor gardens, libraries, wardrobes, and everything else typically found in a furniture and interiors showroom, and more.
This chapter is a playful response to the often beige and neutral color palettes offered by the capitalist world, designed to cater to low-risk, mass-market tastes and sales. IKEA in the Auntieverse is an absurd and whimsical dreamland for aunties who seek fun and self-expression. The spaces are customized with a multitude of colors and intricate details, challenging the idea of practicality but igniting imagination about designing one's unique living spaces. It's a chapter that celebrates self-expression and individuality in interior design.
Chapter 9 MoMA
MOMA, short for the Museum of Modern Aunties, is an art gallery entirely dedicated to aunties and managed by aunties themselves. This chapter within the Auntieverse serves as a celebration of auntie culture, depicting it as positive, engaging, and enjoyable.
The imagined spaces in this chapter include museum shops, restaurants, outdoor courtyards for dining, swimming pools, lecture spaces, and even a wing for painting and sculpture restoration, along with workshops. MOMA not only functions as an art space but also as a community center specifically designed for aunties. It serves as a public space where nature meets gatherings, embodying the spirit and vibrancy of auntie culture.
Chapter 10 NASA
Nice Aunties Sushi Academy, abbreviated as NASA, is a unique cooking school located on the moon within the Auntieverse. This chapter embodies my personal desire for aunties to share their vast knowledge and exceptional cooking skills with the world. It envisions an educational institution dedicated to passing on the culinary expertise of aunties.
Within this chapter, you'll find scenes that explore the harvesting of fish and ingredients from the moon's cores, which is both absurd and a reflection of humanity's aspirations for interplanetary resource exploration. The imagery includes depictions of large cold storage facilities for ingredients, aunties demonstrating food preparation techniques, food processing facilities, and classrooms where culinary knowledge is imparted.
Read More
Artworks:
Featured
All
Inquire about Chapter No. 9, MoMA #0844 by Niceaunties
Back
Niceaunties
Chapter No. 9, MoMA #0844
2024
Details
Artwork ID
844
Category
NFT Edition
Unique
Physical Edition
Ed. of 5, 39 x 39 inches (1/5 reserved for NFT holder)
Print Status
Available
The Auntieverse is an imaginary parallel universe filled with aunties living alongside fantastical creatures made of plastic and trash. It’s a whimsical world where recurring characters like the Frog Assistant and Cat make appearances in both images and video narratives. In this universe, aunties run wild with imagination, unbound by rules, regulations, or the typical laws of physics. It’s an ever-expanding cosmos filled with cities, adventures, subplots, and environments that often mirror our real world—though with alternate endings and a light-hearted perspective.
At the start of the project, the Auntieverse revolved around aunties meeting in an interstellar “Club 33,” where they shared stories of their adventures. As the project evolved, the visuals and narratives began to be told directly from the aunties’ point of view, expanding into themes like social and community dynamics, beauty, body image, and puns (TESLA, NASA, etc.), as well as environmental issues, fashion, and even esoteric topics like jellies, energy, and planetary alignment.
The Auntieverse has grown organically, reflecting my own views and forming new opinions along the way. It holds the potential to be a forever project, given its limitless scope and inspiration drawn from the real world. Everyday life, history, pop culture, current events—all these elements can be magnified and transformed into uplifting tales within the Auntieverse.
Chapter 1 Auntiecity
'The Auntie City' depicts everyday life in the Auntieverse, a world both run and built by aunties.
This world blends the ordinary with the extraordinary, filled with things aunties enjoy. The scenes include living quarters fashioned from stacks of Tupperware, sushi, and vegetables, alongside a vibrant depiction of city life viewed through building cross-sections. Here, both solitary aunties and groups interact with various creatures and city elements, walking around, socialising, and observing the hustle and bustle.
The concept of 'The Auntie City' draws inspiration from the 'walking city' idea by the 1960s British avant-garde architecture group Archigram. This concept envisaged a city capable of moving across land and water to utilise different resources and adapt to changing needs. In Auntieverse, this idea is manifested through buildings equipped with legs, making them mobile and adaptable. Aunties in this world creatively envision cascading pools in mid-air, playgrounds, and connecting bridges in the midst of high-rise apartment blocks. The use of Tupperware in this segment symbolises both the pervasive nature of plastics in our lives and the fear of ageing and societal isolation.
Chapter 2 Spa Menu
'Spa Menu' is a continual exploration of themes revolving around beauty, skin, and youth.
Set in Auntie’s Beauty Spa, this chapter showcases a realm of intense beauty treatments, including acupuncture and body wraps using fresh ingredients. Here, aunties are depicted enduring various beauty sessions, often maintaining a smile through the process.
Portraits of aunties receiving facial treatments feature a mix of different elements – parts of creatures, ingredients, objects, and needles – adorning their faces. Tiny construction workers and machines are also depicted busily at work on their visages. These images symbolise the discomfort and effort women endure to conform to societal standards of youth and beauty. The level of alteration and treatment they undergo is likened to a mini construction site, highlighting the extensive and often painful lengths undertaken in the pursuit of these ideals.
Chapter 3 Factory
A factory where aunties produce giant sushi rolls for various purposes other than eating. The imagery captures the social life of the aunties within the factory and the complex network of sushi production belts.
The concept of sushi, typically associated with freshness, being produced in a factory setting, creates a sense of discomfort and 'wrongness'. This chapter in the Auntieverse shows the factory's integration into the urban landscape and its internal environment. Inside, aunties are seen socialising in the canteen, relaxing in large ramen bowls, participating in group yoga sessions, or moving around the facility on giant sushi rolls. These scenes reveal the day-to-day life in 'Auntie’s Factory', adding another layer to the Auntieverse.
Chapter 4 Auntique
The Auntique chapter of Auntieverse features portraits of aunties engaged in various activities and settings, captured in black and white vintage visuals. Each image highlights an auntie proudly sporting a large, sculptural hairdo.
There seems to be no concern for impracticality or absurdity in these styles. This chapter is an exploration of the impact of hairdos, focusing on their scales and shapes. It pays tribute to the attention and care Asian aunties devote to their perms, whether to cover bald spots or to reflect their significant presence and personalities.
It serves as a commentary on the ultimate self expression of beauty and style.
Chapter 5 Auntiesocial
The ‘auntiesocial’ chapter celebrates community and sisterhood.
They can be seen participating in fun tour groups, making quirky dramatic expressions together, dancing, partying, wading through dreamscapes, cooking and sharing meals, posing together under the full moon, and even donning mermaid tails. It pays tribute to my mother's active lifestyle, which contrasts with her mother's more sedentary existence.
Chapter 6 Fashion
The fashion chapter of Auntieverse features everyday objects and cooking ingredients on the fashion runway, a stage typically reserved for the young, beautiful, and perfect fashion designs.
Aunties' fashion philosophy is to showcase the things they take pride in, such as daily household tasks like laundry, cleaning, and cooking.
This chapter highlights the textures of vegetables, appliances, and food, while also questioning the ideal body image through playful scaling and quantities of body parts.
Chapter 7 TESLA
The Tofu Engineered Sushi Luxury Autos, known as TESLA, is a concept in Auntieverse where vehicles are constructed entirely from biodegradable and edible materials.
In this chapter, we find images of a manufacturing plant where groups of aunties assemble vehicles using tofu, sushi ingredients, and legs to create modes of transportation. On the highways of Auntieverse, we see a variety of vehicles resembling coaches, construction cranes, tractors, and smaller automobiles, all driven by cheerful aunties and accompanied by whimsical creatures. The chapter also includes scenes of car washes and a scrapyard, providing a comprehensive view of this unique world. It is worth noting that in the Hokkien dialect, the word for "car" sounds similar to "leg," leading to a common pun among Singaporeans who humorously claim to own "cars," signifying their reliance on their own legs for transportation.
Chapter 8 IKEA
I.K.E.A. in the Auntieverse, stands for "Interstellar Kawaii Environment for Aunties." It represents a unique furniture showroom planet where only customized interior designs and fittings are available, and modular products are nowhere to be found.
I.K.E.A. offers a wide range of vibrant colors and unconventional interior spaces. Aunties inhabit and interact with spaces that include creatures, wine, ramps, playrooms, indoor gardens, libraries, wardrobes, and everything else typically found in a furniture and interiors showroom, and more.
This chapter is a playful response to the often beige and neutral color palettes offered by the capitalist world, designed to cater to low-risk, mass-market tastes and sales. IKEA in the Auntieverse is an absurd and whimsical dreamland for aunties who seek fun and self-expression. The spaces are customized with a multitude of colors and intricate details, challenging the idea of practicality but igniting imagination about designing one's unique living spaces. It's a chapter that celebrates self-expression and individuality in interior design.
Chapter 9 MoMA
MOMA, short for the Museum of Modern Aunties, is an art gallery entirely dedicated to aunties and managed by aunties themselves. This chapter within the Auntieverse serves as a celebration of auntie culture, depicting it as positive, engaging, and enjoyable.
The imagined spaces in this chapter include museum shops, restaurants, outdoor courtyards for dining, swimming pools, lecture spaces, and even a wing for painting and sculpture restoration, along with workshops. MOMA not only functions as an art space but also as a community center specifically designed for aunties. It serves as a public space where nature meets gatherings, embodying the spirit and vibrancy of auntie culture.
Chapter 10 NASA
Nice Aunties Sushi Academy, abbreviated as NASA, is a unique cooking school located on the moon within the Auntieverse. This chapter embodies my personal desire for aunties to share their vast knowledge and exceptional cooking skills with the world. It envisions an educational institution dedicated to passing on the culinary expertise of aunties.
Within this chapter, you'll find scenes that explore the harvesting of fish and ingredients from the moon's cores, which is both absurd and a reflection of humanity's aspirations for interplanetary resource exploration. The imagery includes depictions of large cold storage facilities for ingredients, aunties demonstrating food preparation techniques, food processing facilities, and classrooms where culinary knowledge is imparted.
Read More
Listen to an Audio Reflection from Niceaunties discussing this work.