The musée MaGMA.sg collection, lovingly assembled over the past 13 years by two passionate Singapore-based Collectors include more than 200 original works of Asian contemporary art.

Musée MaGMA.sg (MaGMA), a Singapore-based contemporary art collection, announces the virtual opening of its exhibition “Fairy Tales” with the launch of a revolutionary iPad app, available now on the Apple App Store.

At the heart of musée MaGMA.sg origins is a profound and life-changing encounter with a Roy Lichtenstein painting, Desk Calendar (1962), at MOCA in Los Angeles. The encounter, entitled the Calendar Story, marked an early and spectacular milestone for two lives coming to union and the subsequent building of a contemporary art collection.

The musée MaGMA.sg collection, lovingly assembled over the past 13 years by two passionate Singapore-based Collectors include more than 200 original works of Asian contemporary art in different media by renowned artists such as Liu Ye, Nyoman Masriadi, Yue Minjun, Wang Guangyi and Zeng Fanzhi.

musée MaGMA.sg’s curator Wang Zineng explains: “Fairy Tales is musée MaGMA.sg's first single-focus exhibition, a culmination of more than a few years of imaginative and bold visioning, meticulous research, adventurous collecting and most importantly of all, an unwavering belief in the power and actuality of divine providence. Driven by the Calendar Story, Fairy Tales affects visitors with the power of each of its intriguing episodes, extending what has begun as a personal oral narrative into a compelling story of love, fate, wonder and quest for truth cast in a virtual exhibition form.”

A revolutionary app

The iPad app includes 26 poetic episodes (“diptychs”) from the “Fairy Tales” exhibition. Each diptych comprises a poem or narrative by the Collectors, illustrated with an iconic contemporary artwork from musée MaGMA.sg’s collection and transformed into a multi sensory experience. The iPad app offers a choice of three pre-set tours, as well as the flexibility for the user to meander freely through this virtual exhibition.

Users can get close-up views of each artwork with superb definition and also immerse in each episode, by listening to the masterful oration of each poem by Singapore’s renowned thespian Mr Ivan Heng. The Collectors fondly remember the French acting legend Gérard Philipe reading The Little Prince, Peter and the Wolf and the life of Mozart on LPs found in children books and these serve as an inspiration for the genesis of this iPad app.

Accompanying features include original music by Mr Ian Chee, dj George Leong, and Ms Andayoma; a foreword by Maria Giuseppina Caccia Dominioni Panza; an introduction by Mr Kwok Kian Chow of the National Art Gallery, Singapore; curatorial notes by Christie’s specialist Mr Wang Zineng; an interview with Mr Mitchell Lichtenstein; as well as exhibition notes by Mr Jean-François Milou, MaGMA’s scenographer and chief architect of the National Art Gallery, Singapore