Sharon Chin

The hashtag #KitaLawan appeared in February, after Anwar Ibrahim was convicted of sodomy and sent to jail for the second time. In the beginning, I saw both #KitaLawan and #KamiLawan being used, which was interesting.

‘Kita’ and ‘kami’ are collective pronouns meaning ‘we’, but the latter is closer to ‘us’ – an other, i.e. a ‘them’, is explicit when using ‘kami’. Thus, ‘negara kita’ means ‘the country belonging to all of us’, while ‘negara kami’ means ‘the country belonging to us, not including you/them/other people’.

The image of bright yellow lalang growing over a Barisan Nasional banner has hovered in my mind since 2013. It sometimes comes into sharp focus, but I’ve yet to pin it down. This was an experiment cutting lalang out of scrap pieces of yellow fabric – a patchwork of resistance, a loose web against an unchanging background.

Antid Oto – italian for antidote – was one of Leon Trotsky‘s earliest pen names. I also love the Malay word for it: penawar. A few months ago, I started taking regular walks and making drawings afterwards as a way to deal with worry, procrastination, hopelessness, writer’s block, internet rage, and digital distraction. I’ll post a series of them here, one every other day, for as long as I keep making them.

Official permission-granting crest, featuring the mascots Yay and Nay, two synapses from opposing sides of your very own brain! They cause terrible tension but are basically telling you the same thing: ‘Bikin Sampai Jadi’, that is, keep making it till it’s made. The lowly earthworm and El Mudskipper agree that you should get down and dirty with those hands. Do you trust them to lead you to the water?

My partner, that is, my lover and friend, my dear companion, the person I live with and have sex with, but am not married to, always tells me that I can’t keep projecting the power struggles I have with my family as a reflection of how power plays out on a national level.

I can’t help it. To become the woman I needed to be, or wanted to be (I can’t tell the difference), I’ve had to be a bad daughter. Being a bad daughter has meant being more free, but also, perhaps, less loved, and certainly, less liked.

I was a ‘daddy’s girl’. If that sounds gross to me now, it’s because I used to revel in it, to be loved simply for being pleasing – for being a good daughter. My father and I used to drink whiskey and talk into the night. People praised us for having a great relationship.

My father was the cool one, the one to be with, who got things done. People respected him, and his decisions ruled our fates. My mother was the embarrassing, irrational, emotional person who cried, whose voice shook when she spoke in public. To be close to my father meant being closer to power. That’s where I got my power.

My feminism comes from the silence of my mother. I began to notice that my father doesn’t hear what she says. I notice that as she gets older, people literally do not SEE her. When I was out with both of them recently, people greeted my father and me, but not my mother!

And there isn’t enough time to tell you how often I have undermined my mother, refused to hear her, been embarrassed by her emotion or tears, her suddenly saying inappropriate things at awkward times. Just as I myself, and women I know, have been ignored, spoken over, undermined in meetings, or whatever, while colleagues, self-avowed progressives, have stayed silent, only to come to me afterwards, telling me they were sorry about what happened and had my back the whole time. And they(we) call them(our)selves feminists? Motherfuckers.

Even though I’m trying now, I feel as though I don’t have enough time left in my life to hear all the things that my mother has yet to say.

I don’t know how and when I started to notice this. I don’t know when I started to be a bad daughter, to hear my mother, and insist on her being heard, to combat my father but not love him any less, and to unwind this love from the power that he holds, and feels entitled to.

Men, I notice, suffer too. I have read that older, straight men especially, are chronically under-touched – they lack platonic skin-to-skin contact, which releases Oxytocin in the brain, important in combating depression and stress. When I found out my father was seriously ill, I remember feeling a strange pang of loss and fear, not for him, but for myself, as if his diminishment was my own. It made me wonder whether we allow the men in our lives to be weak or vulnerable, to cry? Or are we ashamed of them? Once, when my father broke down at a public event after hearing some distressing news, I remember my mother, scandalized, saying to him: ‘Don’t do this to me now’. And I have had strong, independent, women friends say to me: ‘I make decisions all day at work, when I come home, I want a man who takes charge.’

I grew up reading. My mother would leave me with a stack of books in her office for hours, while she taught classes at the university. Ursula Le Guin’s Earthsea books somehow got into my bones. They made my soul, which books do when you’re young. Much later, when I was college, she continued the Earthsea series with Tehanu, which has been called (mostly unflatteringly) a revisionist, feminist fantasy:

‘“If women had power, what would men be but women who can’t bear children? And what would women be but men who can?”

“Hah!” went Tenar; and presently, with some cunning, she said, “Haven’t there been queens? Weren’t they women of power?”

“A queen’s only a she-king,” said Ged.

She snorted.

“I mean, men give her power. They let her use their power. But it isn’t hers, is it? It isn’t because she’s a woman that she’s powerful, but despite it.

“Why are men afraid of women?”

If your strength is only the other’s weakness, you live in fear,” Ged said.

“Yes; but women seem to fear their own strength, to be afraid of themselves.”

“Are they ever taught to trust themselves?” Ged asked, and as he spoke Therru came in on her work again. His eyes and Tenar’s met.

“No,” she said. “Trust is not what we’re taught.” She watched the child stack the wood in the box. “If power were trust,” she said. “I like that word. If it weren’t all these arrangements – one above the other – kings and masters and mages and owners – It all seems so unnecessary. Real power, real freedom, would lie in trust, not force.”

Is that when I started to notice things like my father and mother? To count, with almost pathological reflexivity, how many women there are included in any event, or on any committee? I can’t be sure.

My feminism has been an uncertain thing, a path in the darkness, burning my doubt like a candle to find the way. My mother led me to books, to Ursula’s books, which led me to feminism, which led me back to my mother’s silence and my father’s pain – a circular journey, leading out and back again, searching for ways to get out from under the power that holds things as they are. I have been led all my life, and I have followed, am still following, searching for the key and the door that leads to freedom.

This is the essay version of a talk I gave at ‘Performing Gender‘, a panel discussion held at Black Box, Publika on 11 April 2015.

About the photo – it’s identified on the internet as a wedding portrait from Budapest, circa 1920. I tried finding the source, but no luck. I first came across it in my Tumblr feed, via thenearsightedmonkey.

I spent last New Year’s Eve alone at my drawing table, drinking whiskey and copying sea animals into my sketchbook. The idea was that I would cross the threshold of the new year doing the thing I hoped to be doing for the next 12 months.

By way of that self-fulfilling prophecy, 2014 became the year of drawing.

(Spotted garden eels copied from a wikicommons photo by Matthias Kabel)

Activity Book was a daily art ritual Zedeck and I started at the beginning of the year. Everyday, in a battered old notebook, he would give me something to draw and I would give him something to write. Pictures blossomed like flowers – some pretty, some ugly – and the rhythm of the days kept my brush moving, an antidote to my ingrained perfectionism.

I drew a story about Samsung workers dying of cancer, that Samsung and the curator they hired didn’t like.

I met Vivian Lee, and made a strange, ambiguous portrait of her.

I drew the places I visited: Kampung Hakka, Japan, Penang. I drew a memorial for MH370 and a hell bank note for Zedeck. At Merdekarya, I drew in front of an audience while live music played in the other room.

I drew portraits and posters in solidarity, and made pretty agitprop.

I drew slides for a talk I gave to college kids about my fear of drawing.

I drew grass and blew it up to a 10ft mural for Five Arts Centre.

I drew a mask-making activity sheet that 200 school kids later drew on, coloured and cut out themselves.

I copied photos and traced the drawings of old masters so my hand could taste the distant shadow of their genius. Some days I hit a wall and couldn’t face another blank page, or the bitter pill of my own mediocrity. When that happened, I quit the old masters and stared at Lynda Barry’s work instead, trying to learn a different, and perhaps deeper, mastery – that the labour of making things with your hands is its own sweet, redemptive reward; the hell with obsessing whether the results are ‘good’ or ‘bad’.

This stuff I can unambiguously say was bad though:

2014 was the death of my social life. Besides social contact from work and family commitments, I didn’t get out much, or, to be honest, at all. I turned down parties, drinks and dinners because all that drawing time had to come from somewhere. I tried to be a good neighbour, friend, girlfriend and family person, but probably failed a little at all of it.

Obsessive drawing meant sitting down for hours at a time, which made me fat and lethargic about leaving the house (and taking showers).

I spent too much wasted time online, sucking tragedy and distraction from the electronic nipple of social media.

The garden is still pathetic and weedy.

Ok, new prophecy:

Every year, the fun fair comes to Port Dickson. On New Year’s Eve, I watched the flashing lights of the ferris wheel glow in the distance. Happy, hysterical screams of people getting spun around on mechanical rides floated over on the cool night air.

I saw the fun fair being taken down and packed up the previous year. They were moving to another town. In broad daylight, stripped of glamour, tons of equipment was moved back into shipping containers. Coils of wire and machine parts lay everywhere. The labour of it all was laid bare.

In 2015, I wish you the finding and doing of similar labour – and its reward, of joy glowing and sounding in the dark.

Happy New Year!

P.S: Before the year ended, I rebuilt my email list and sent out my first newsletter. PLEASE JOIN MY MAILING LIST by clicking here or entering your email on the sidebar to the left. The newsletter looks like this. Each one is special, with art and writing that doesn’t exist anywhere else online. No spam, ever. I’ll send them only once (or very rarely, twice) a month at most, and you can unsubscribe anytime.

More sketchbook drawings:

Students have been occupying the entrance (Gate KL) to Universiti Malaya since 10 Dec. They are protesting the university’s treatment of eight students, known as the UM8, who have been suspended and fined for organizing a talk by de-facto opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim on campus last month.

They are calling for all charges to be dropped immediately.

Follow OccupyUM on Facebook and Twitter.

Click image above to open in a new window, then right click and ‘Save As’ to download. Printable up to A3 size. Free to copy, print, distribute and modify for non-commercial purposes only. Please credit or link back where possible.

Smaller size image here.

Art proposals are the secret key of the art world game. They are how, armed with nothing more than an idea on paper, you can unlock money and opportunities, like this (deadline: 1 Dec 2014 / 1 Jun 2015), and this (deadline: 31 Dec 2014).

I’ve burned more hours than I can count putting together proposals for myself and friends in need. Do I wish I could’ve spent those hours making art? Yes, but this is the hustle I needed to learn to construct my dreams in reality. It’s changing – soon, knowing how to make a great Kickstarter video will be more important. But for now, Time + Sweat = I got good at art proposals, and I’m sharing what I’ve learned because I think it’s still useful.

I included an actual proposal at the end.

1. Read the guidelines

Stick to the guidelines and word limits. Read about the organization. Find out what projects or people they’ve funded in the past. Is there a pattern? Do they have a preference for innovation, collaboration, networking or community engagement? Highlight the parts of your project that might appeal to them.

2. People are gonna tell you to write your proposal early

Well, they’re right, and they’re not the ones who need to read this. For the rest of us human beings, a confession: every proposal I sent was worked on feverishly at and up to, the last possible moment.

Proposal writing is a dreadful, laborious chore. The best advice I have is to give yourself about 3 days to write the sucker, but for two weeks before, think about your project all the time – who it’s for, why you’re doing it, and how. Hopefully, when you finally sit your procrastinating ass down, your thoughts will have marinated enough, which is half the battle. This allows you to focus on writing clearly.

3. To start, write it out quickly, all at once

Seriously, set a timer for 25 minutes and vomit it on to the page. Don’t stop to edit or think too much until you fill all the sections of your application from beginning to end, once. Then go back and refine. Refine again. And again. Until it’s good.

4. Write it in the language you know best

Everything depends on clear articulation of your idea, plan and intentions. You can’t be thinking clearly in a language you don’t know well. Translate it yourself or ask a friend do it afterwards. But write it in your first language.

Note to funders: You can drastically level the playing field by allowing people to submit proposals in their own language, in addition to English. Proposal writing is real labour – the time required can deter many deserving applicants, especially if it eats into income generating work. In my opinion, the costs of translation should be borne by the funding organization, not the applicant.

5. Write it like a human being

Don’t use jargon. Don’t use big words or complicated sentences. Don’t be vague. Focus. Sharpen your mind and then sharpen your words to reflect your thoughts. Think of the human being reading it on the other end. They don’t need to be impressed. They just need to know what your project is.

Note to funders: Make your application simple to fulfill. Treat the person writing it like a human being. Don’t make it harder than it has to be. See above note about labour.

6. Order your information

Keep the conceptual (your motivation, ideology, objectives) and the practical (logistics, process, timeline) separate. Create sections with headings. Don’t repeat yourself. Make sure every section and sentence conveys new and vital information.

7. Make smart use of bullet points and tables

This breaks up the page and is easier to read than paragraphs of text.

8. Don’t turn your project into something you don’t want to do just to get the grant

It will create inconsistencies and weaken your proposal. Also, what’s the point?

9. Budget

Decide the total budget first and break it down from there – this lets you (and your funder) immediately sense the overall scale of your project. The expectations of a RM20,000 project will be very different to a RM100,000 one.

If the grant amount offered is less than what you need for the entire project, break it down into parts and state which parts you’re applying to get funded (see example proposal below). Do not attempt to fit your project into a vastly smaller budget than you actually need. It will show on paper like a sore thumb.

The budget is not set in stone. If you get funded, it can and probably will change. The point is to demonstrate that you have thought through what you’ll need and what it will cost. Basic research is too easy not to do. E.g. if one of the items is accommodation, find out what the real prices are.

10. Specific details win over arty idealism

Think of the latter as sugar and spice. The details of your project, and how you’re going to get it done is the meat and rice.

11. Treat this as reality bootcamp for your idea

It’s a merciless exercise in getting down on paper exactly what you want to do and what it’s going to take to do it. Write proposals even if (especially if) there aren’t any grants available right now. Give birth to your dreams in ink, so that when opportunity approaches, they can leap off the page like electricity to become something solid in the world.

12. You can do it. I believe in you.

—-

This is the proposal for ‘In The Land That Never Was Dry’, my comics journalism project about water. It was recently awarded a grant from the Krishen Jit ASTRO Fund. This is for educational purposes only, please ask permission before you copy or reproduce any part of it. If you can’t see the reader below, go here.

‘And when the Tan Sri awoke in his afterworld he was already rich – not only rich with cash; he owned vast swathes of property, across several levels in prime locations, with the proper documents as proof.

Within three months of the Tan Sri’s arrival in the underworld, Capital UCB opened its first branch in the mansions of the earth. By the yellow springs, groundwork for Cityview Phase Six was laid. It was a luxurious mixed development: condominiums, commercial arcades, nail bars and coffee shops.’

I drew this picture for ‘Hell Money‘, a short story by Zedeck Siew (my brilliant non-husband and dear companion). You can read the whole story here.

We also art bombed the streets of Petaling Jaya and Georgetown with this story, which was fun. Zedeck blogged the adventure here.

Sketch stage:

Next year I want to print a bunch of these and actually burn them during Hungry Ghost month. I imagine it would be therapeutic.

This weekend, two of my works will be put up for auction by the person who bought them at my first solo show, ten years ago.

The gallery that showed them is now closed. I still remember opening night – I got there late, and I have been showing up late to my openings ever since.

Everything in that exhibition sold – another pattern that has repeated itself over the years. The market has always played a role in my art. Or is it the other way around?

I’m grateful to the people who buy my work, show after show. Along with the cash to fuel the next project, consistently selling out has brought opportunity, recognition and legitimacy.

So why do I have mixed feelings about my auction debut? Partly it’s because I haven’t fully reconciled to the reality that I’m a politically aware, socially engaged, peddler of luxury objects. Partly it’s the fact that I don’t know enough about auctions, and we fear what we don’t understand.

The former trouble will need more time and thought before I can write about it usefully. I decided to deal with the latter by sending a long list of questions to Shyan, art enthusiast and writer of the blog Art KL-itique. I find his outsider perspective useful, particularly his takes on money in Malaysian art. His answers are forthright and detailed. I hope you get as much out of them as I did.

Disclosure: I’ve been a regular reader of Art KL-itique for awhile now. Shyan and I have corresponded casually over email, and he has expressed interest in buying my work.

We’ve only met on the Internet. I know you through your blog, Art KL-itique, which I find refreshingly broad, yet personal and analytical at the same time. Can you say more about your background and what got you interested in Malaysian art, so we get an idea where you’re coming from?

I discovered Malaysian art in 2012, and found solace in the art gallery amidst a very busy year professionally and personally. I have always been interested in history, art, and culture, and despite having the privilege of travelling to many places, I had no idea what Malaysian art was until 2012. I am not from the art industry, have never studied art formally (engineer by training, business process consulting by profession), and am surrounded by people whose idea of good art are Impressionist paintings. It was difficult at first to know where to look and to locate local art events.

After many gallery visits, I remain fascinated that Malaysian visual arts produce compelling works, and its industry/scene reflects a microcosm of Malaysian urban life. My personal interest in aesthetics (i.e. “why does this appeal to me?”) and local content (i.e. I grew up and live in KL/PJ), drove me to document my observations and thoughts, within a defined scope.

Is it accurate to say that your work in the corporate sector has given you the background knowledge to contextualize how auctions work, in terms of their mechanics as a financial instrument?

It is a statement I find hard to agree with, because when I write about money in Malaysian art and include the analogy of the stock market, my knowledge of the stock market is entirely personal, i.e. my job does not require knowledge of the stock market. I would attribute my arguments to a general knowledge of corporate business, and from the art market reports I read from art publications.

Shyan, explain the mechanics of an art auction to me like I’m 5 years old.

“So… Mummy did a painting and sold it to Aunty Rose for $100, who hangs it on a wall in her house. Aunty Rose had an open house one day and her friend Uncle Chris tells her that this painting on her wall is now worth $500. Uncle Chris says he has five friends who are willing to spend at least $500 on Mummy’s painting, and Aunty Rose should put this painting up for auction. Aunty Rose agrees. Uncle Chris informs his friends that Mummy’s painting will be sold to the highest bidder in the auction, and he estimates that the painting will be sold between $500 and $700. During the auction, Mummy’s painting is presented in front of a crowd whose eyes are glued to the overhead screen. “450, 500… 700, 750, 750 going once, 750 going twice, SOLD!” Uncle Chris manages to sell the painting to his friend who pays him $840, out of which he hands $750 to Aunty Rose, and keeps the remainder to himself. What did Mummy get? Nothing? You are right! Clever girl…”

What is an estimate price and who or what decides it? And how is that related to ‘buyer’s premium?’

The auction house specialist decides on the estimates, based on factors such as previous sales record, type, medium, size, provenance (who were the previous collector(s)), how well-exhibited is the artist, is the artist still producing work, how significant is the work within the artist’s oeuvre, rarity, condition, and how many collectors do the specialist know who are pursuing work by this artist.

A ‘buyer’s premium’ is a fixed percentage amount (12% for Henry Butcher Art Auctioneers) paid on top of the hammer price for a successfully auctioned work. It functions like a sales commission paid to the auction house.

The ‘buyer’s premium’ is reported in the final sales amount, but not factored into the estimates. For example, a work is estimated at RM 7,000 – 10,000. The bid starts at RM 6,500 with an increment of RM 500 and eventually hammered down at RM 9,000, still within the estimates. Factor in the ‘buyer’s premium’ at 12%, and the successful bidder pays RM 10,800. This gives the auction house a legit reason to announce that this work “sold over the highest estimates”.

Here’s a link to art auction lingo.

You wrote a blogpost, ‘Money in (Malaysian) Art‘ where you used words like BUY, HOLD, SELL and TRADING BUY, and I was like, OMG, foreign language, artist brain not understand. Can you translate those terms into human speak?

Those words are quoted in analyst reports produced by stock brokers, as recommendations to potential investors regarding a particular stock in the stock market:

‘BUY’ – recommends the investor to buy stock, because the broker thinks the stock has potential to provide the investor substantial returns in the future.

‘HOLD’ – recommends the investor who owns stock to not sell stock, because the broker thinks the stock may still have potential to provide the investor significant returns.

‘SELL’ – recommends the investor who owns stock to sell stock, because the broker thinks the stock has lost its potential to provide the investor significant returns.

‘TRADING BUY’ – recommends the active investor to buy stock, because the broker thinks the stock has potential to provide the investor significant returns in the short-term future.

Stocks, as a perceived valuation of a corporate entity, are markedly different from an artwork, which is a product. I used this analogy, because proponents of “art investment” refer to art as a commodity traded within a relatively small marketplace, similar to the stock market.

The secondary art market is like the stock market in one aspect – the value of an individual stock/artwork is based much more on perception than on fundamentals. This explains why contemporary art has leapfrogged other art categories in terms of sales in recent years. The current value of one Koons’ ‘Balloon Dog’ ($30 – 50M), can buy someone a Raphael drawing, a Rembrandt etching, a Rodin sculpture, a small Degas, AND perhaps even a Klee painting. The latter five artists have a firm place within the Western art canon (strong fundamentals), but the former (Jeff Koons) is perceived as the greater artist due to his higher auction value. This is partly because the auction houses have successfully promoted art as a trophy collectible.

The estimate on my work is RM3,000 – 5,000. At the lowest estimate that’s 5 – 6 times the original selling price in 2005, almost 10 years ago. Where did that extra value come from? Did I create it? Did time create it?

You, by virtue of being alive and still actively producing art over the past decade, and taking part in art events (especially international ones), helped contribute to that valuation.

Since this is your auction debut, and you have not produced or sold similar works recently, I guess that the specialist provided the valuation based on a current assessment. There is no need to regard what the original price was, if one knows that there are collectors willing to pay this amount currently, for a collage work of this size, by a practicing (for 10 years) Malaysian contemporary artist.

Should I care about this art auction, considering that if my work sells none of that extra value actually comes to me? Bonus question: where does the profit go? How is the pie divided?

The secondary market wants you to believe that the art auction is important for you (the artist), by insinuating that the price of a successfully auctioned work, helps determine the price of your artworks in the primary market. If your work successfully sells above the high estimate (e.g. RM 5,040 with ‘buyer’s premium’), feel free to price your next collage on paper work, sized ~20 by 30 inches, at RM 5,000. None of the extra (real) value went to you now, but your future (potential) value has just increased!

The secondary art market wants you to believe in this theory, because they want to control your prices, a logical thing to do in a capitalist marketplace. If you subscribe to this theory and follow the (secondary) market trend for pricing of your future works, you put yourself at risk of a marketplace where prices can go up but also go down. Some argue that the primary art market and galleries do the same (which I agree), but I think any respectable gallery will not depress prices of an artist it represents. A gallery is held accountable when prices are set too high (its reputation and represented artist suffers); whereas an auction house can cover up unsold works due to overestimation, by placing the blame on the “free market”.

For each successfully auctioned work, the hammer price amount goes to the consignor (i.e. seller), and the ‘buyer’s premium’ goes to the auction house, who then needs to pay its specialists, catalogue writer, framer, movers, auctioneer, venue rental, insurance, marketing, etc. The auction house may also entice a collector to sell a prominent work (beneficial to its own publicity) by offering to share a cut of the ‘buyer’s premium’, or pay a conditional fee, but this practice is only apparent for the large auction houses (i.e. Sotheby’s and Christie’s).

Is it bad for me if the work doesn’t sell?

Since “art investment” is touted so often nowadays, it is inevitable that collectors will assess an artist’s investment potential before purchasing a work. Your non-selling work may then become a factor.

However, if you believe that you produce good art, and good art sells itself, not selling a work in auction is a non-factor.

By talking about the auction like this publicly, are we manipulating the market?

No, that would be overestimating our influence.

Art is historically an elitist endeavour that are sold as luxury items, and that definition remains till this day. Luxury items are frequently sold based on a personal relationship between seller and buyer. We can talk about the risk in art auctions, but if a potential collector trusts a specialist and his/her sales pitch, the transaction will take place regardless.

Just for fun, if I wanted to, what other ways could I manipulate the market?

As an artist, you can bid up the price or sell to yourself via a proxy. You do not even need a friend to be physically present at the auction, since one with a valid credit card can register as an absentee bidder, telephone bidder, and for Henry Butcher, even as an online bidder.

What you can do, a collector can do better. A collector who owns ten works of yours, can choose to sell one of your works in the next seven art auctions, effectively making you ‘in demand’. To create this perception, the collector has to ensure there are people bidding up and buying your works at these auctions, so that’s where the proxy trick may come into play. A collector can also stage a “solo exhibition” of your works from the collector’s own collection, and commission a catalogue, in order to boost your artist credentials that may result in a higher valuation in the next auction.

What you or a collector can do, an auction house can do better. Possessing a wider network of collectors, it is easier for the auction house to manufacture an ‘in demand’ scenario as described above. An auction house can also choose to under-price your estimates, so that your work gets sold “over the high estimates”, which creates the perception that you are ‘in demand’.

More complex transactions include the use of guarantees by Christie’s and Sotheby’s, where a work is guaranteed to sell, thus maintaining the perceived value of an artist. These guaranteed amounts can be borne either by the auction house or a third-party underwriter. More about guarantees in this Financial Times article.

Thanks Shyan! I’ve learned alot from this.

*The title of this post was inspired by an essay called ‘Explain Bitcoin Like I’m 5‘ by Nik Custodio.

Sharon Chin

Artist Sharon Chin's Site

Author Archives: Sharon Chin

Antid Oto #2: #KitaLalang

Antid Oto #1: Permission

Bad Daughter, or, Where I Got My Feminism

Self-fulfilling Prophecy: Things I Did in 2014

#OccupyUM

A Decade of Art Proposals – What I’ve learned (and a real example)