[COMMA] Experimentation Ground: vortex

Akbar Syadiq is a multidisciplinary creative whose work spans scenic design, costume and props fabrication, and image-making, with a focus on speculative world-building in performance and design.

His design credits include SUARA/ORO RUA (Singapore International Festival of Arts, 2024), RATA (The Esplanade, 2022), and A Clockwork Orange (Teater Ekamatra, 2019). He has collaborated with companies such as The Opera People, Young & Wild, The Necessary Stage, Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay, and Cake Theatrical Productions.

Syadiq approaches material, technique, and storytelling with a hands-on mindset, contributing to visually compelling and thought-provoking works rooted in process and collaboration.

Instagram: @a.syadiq

YS is the moniker/handle for a creative project shared between Nipuna Jayasekera & Leon Wan, active since 2014 is a decade long collaboration that has seen output in all forms of multimedia from audio to visual. The distinctive aesthetic hallmarks of YS have become a well engrained feature of their work by now despite an approach that has remained varied and dynamic during this time period. From functional music to more conceptually driven pursuits, the reach forged through their idiosyncratic explorations of various forms and genres has seen connections formed well beyond traditional music spaces into more contemplative areas of home listening, ambience, poetry and sound. The label they share ERF revisits their earlier formal studies in the realm of music and sound design, the latest iteration of their works falling in the categories of experimental music, plunder-phonics, music concrete, and the re-collection and interpretation of experiential artefacts, samples & examples of the contemporary experience laid bare with pathos in confronting, personal & often cathartic ways. Notable works include, ’Free/Apples’ (2021) with New York Artist/Poet Alex Bienstock and ‘Non Partial’ (2024) – a collection of self-produced media files, music, images, & video works – on their own imprint ERF as well as LP’s such as ‘Brutal Flowers’ (2023) on Pace Yourself & their latest release ‘Burn’ (2025) a split label release between the aforementioned labels.

Instagram: @y_systems