About the award
Established as the National Youth Film Awards since 2015, the Singapore Youth Film Festival (SYFF) serves as a national platform celebrating the achievements of exceptional young filmmakers while fostering a deeper appreciation for local films and filmmaking. SYFF builds upon its legacy of fostering award-winning filmmakers.
The SYFF Youth Inspiration Award was introduced in 2019 to recognise and honour young industry professionals who have made exemplary contributions towards the filmmaking industry in Singapore.
Mark Chua and Lam Li Shuen are presented this award in recognition for their innovative work across film and arts, along with their commitment to nurturing emerging filmmakers. Through their independent production studio and involvement in workshops and mentoring, they have made a significant impact to younger Singapore filmmakers.
Through their work at various international film festivals, such as Berlinale, Locarno, and more, Mark and Li Shuen have been able to introduce their work and that of other emerging Singaporean filmmakers to a global audience. This international exposure has opened doors for many young filmmakers to showcase their work abroad. For their excellent body of work and commitment in nurturing the next generation, they are certainly deserving of this award.
About the award recipient
Mark Chua and Lam Li Shuen are a filmmaker and artist duo from Singapore. They met through forming an art rock group and started out making lo-fi underground films as self-taught filmmakers. Over the years of their partnership, they have carved out a cinema of speculative fiction and body horror, exploring existential anxiety, histories and alienation.
Their films have screened at international film festivals including the International Film Festival Rotterdam (2024, 2023), New Directors/New Films (2023) and BFI London Film Festival (2021). In 2021, with their short film A Man Trembles, they were awarded Best Southeast Asian Director at the Singapore International Film Festival. Their feature film project in development, The Want, was selected for Berlinale Talents Script Station 2024.
Chua and Lam have also presented expanded cinema performances with 16mm and Super 8 projections in Zurich and Singapore, and released multiple albums as the art rock duo ARE.
In 2024, they started an artist-run analog film organisation, Film Nerve, focused on analog film experimentation as well as resource and knowledge sharing.
Recipient’s Message
Thank you SYFF for this award, it lifted our sullen spirits after yet another long night building things!
It made us think of the events and screenings, from the cinematheque at NMS to AFA to SGIFF where we’d get inspired by films and people - some who would become dear dear friends. And sharing spirited moments with them, thinking up audacious ideas and mustering a collective courage to see them through! We’re thankful to have been there together and learnt how some courage and some lifting of each other’s spirits is a precious thing.
It’s been a ride and a half so far making films. It can feel so hard in a world focused on packaging everything into a product. But it also feels liberating to unpack it all, and lay it all out like witnessing a dream that sequences our day-to-day experiences.
One thing that vividly stands out about the whole act is that feeling of emerging with a new sense of things from another wearying adventure, thanks very much to the friends and collaborators who encouraged, built and conjured another adventure together.
It’s always special getting to witness a new film. It makes us so happy to see fellow filmmakers with an idea that courageously had to be put to the screen. For us, the process of cinema can be both testing and nourishing all at the same time, all the time. But it’s what we love and we keep coming back. Let’s all keep coming back to what we love lah!