The last two years of the pandemic have been challenging for everyone, including the Singapore Chinese Cultural Centre. The first year taught us to be more resilient and agile as we pivoted to the digital realm. This year, we deepened our digital capabilities and took our programmes to new venues to better engage the public.

This year, our flagship festival Cultural Extravaganza offered the highest number of virtual events. Besides live broadcasts and video-on-demand streaming, we launched It’s FanTEAstic, an online carnival that showcased the history and multi-cultural aspects of tea culture in Singapore, together with fun quizzes, games and a virtual marketplace. In addition, Odyssey offered an unconventional interactive experience of the classic tale Romance of the Three Kingdoms that combined visual arts, gaming and storytelling. Cultural Extravaganza 2021’s digital programmes eventually achieved approximately 300,000 views.

We extended the shelf-life of our exhibitions and made them available to more audiences. Physical displays like Afterwords and Poetic Strokes were adapted to become online exhibitions; while Moo Moo PARK, Mythology and
Secret Ingredients went out to shopping malls, libraries and schools as travelling exhibitions. We also launched the new SINGAPO 人 Online microsite to complement the public’s experience, before or after their visit to our permanent exhibition.

In the last year, we were delighted to be able to deepen ties with our existing partners such as SPH Media Trust’s Chinese Media Group, and kickstart collaborations with new ones such as Singapore Science Centre, Ding Yi Music Company and Paper Monkey Theatre. Past programmes with our partners included the organisation of online lectures under the NUS Lecture series and the launch of cultural picture books with the Ngee Ann Polytechnic.

As we move into 2022, SCCC is also welcoming the 5th anniversary of the opening of our building. With the gradual easing of safe distancing measures, we also look forward to welcoming more visitors back to the premises.

On behalf of SCCC, I would like to extend our utmost gratitude to our donors for their generous support which has enabled us to make our programmes more accessible to the public. Our work would also not have been possible without the support from our board, volunteers and partners. I will be passing on the leadership of the SCCC Board to Mr Ng Siew Quan. I hope that you will continue to support Siew Quan and the new term of Board Directors as they move to the next phase.

We look forward to your continued support as we emerge stronger from the pandemic.