SINGAPORE (ST) – Tonight at Victoria Theatre, Singapore’s 2022 Biennial Singapore Prize ceremony took place, awarding 12 winners across Chinese, English, Malay and Tamil languages. Veteran diplomat Kishore Mahbubani chairing the five-member jury panel stated that Singapore faces its greatest challenge not in economic but creating a sense of national identity through history.
Initiated in 2014 by an anonymous donor, the NUS Singapore History Prize seeks to foster deeper engagement among Singaporeans with their own history. It recognizes works that examine any period, theme, or field related to Singaporean history since pre-1819 while making complex issues easier for non-academic audiences to comprehend.
This year, judges were extremely impressed with the high caliber of submissions. Due to this fact, they issued two special commendations without cash awards: Reviving Qixi: Singapore’s Forgotten Seven Sisters Festival by Lynn Wong and Lee Kok Leong and Theatres of Memory: Industrial Heritage Of 20th Century Singapore by Loh Kah Seng, Alex Tan Tiong Hee, Koh Keng We, Tan Teng Phee and Juria Toramae respectively.
These two stories represent two distinctive but equally important works, and the NUS Singapore History Prize jury commends both authors on their achievements. Thanks to our generous anonymous donor who doubled prize money and added an artistic history category for works engaging with Singapore history deeply, this will remain an open competition over six years.
On Tuesday (7 November), Mediacorp Campus hosted an awards ceremony to announce the winners. Finalists include an Indian manufacturer of solar-powered dryers, a soil carbon marketplace and groups working towards greening electric car batteries, restoring Andean forests and stopping illegal fishing activities. Prince William of Britain, who established his Royal Foundation charity and awarded this prize in 2020, told an audience that all 15 winners’ innovative and impactful solutions demonstrate hope for climate change mitigation. This week, Earthshot Prize award winners are traveling across Europe and North America for an Earthshot Week of thought leadership, innovation and impact. They will present their ideas with global leaders, investors and business partners in order to accelerate and bring solutions faster to market at scale; additionally they will meet members of the public to inspire and empower them in taking climate action – the full list of winners and finalists can be found on Earthshot Prize website.