Koh Kai Ting’s practice focuses on creating visual narratives that explore the conflict between individual happiness and the expectations of society. Looking at the source of pleasure and its psychological trajectory through philosophical texts and her observations of society, Koh’s works question the importance of importance of happiness to one’s life and how much of happiness is under personal control.
Her work is influenced by the sociological and psychoanalysis theories of Spinoza and Freud. Juxtaposing the gratified emotions with bondage and animal as metaphors for human desire, her recent paintings highlight the destructive instinct as part of the unconscious structures of pleasure, hence gaining pleasure through pain.