Objectifs Centre for Photography & Film

Two Singaporeans, Emmeline Yong and Dawn Teo, co-founded Objectifs in 2003, launching it on Liang Seah Street in the Bugis area with the mission to cultivate original voices in visual storytelling through photography and film. The nonprofit moved like a photographer searching for the right frame. It relocated to Arab Street in 2009, occupying four floors of an art deco-influenced shophouse, before landing at its current home at 155 Middle Road in June 2015. The building dates to the 1870s, when it opened as the Christian Institute, and it later became Singapore’s first Straits Chinese Methodist Church. Most recently it housed Sculpture Square, another organization supported under the National Arts Council’s Arts Housing Scheme. Today Objectifs is regarded as one of Southeast Asia’s leading platforms for visual storytelling, running exhibitions, screenings, and developmental initiatives like the Objectifs Documentary Award. The church, it turns out, was built for the gospel. It now serves the lens.