From shamanic rituals to sexual harassment, the 20 programmes of TheatreWorks' upcoming project span a wide range of subjects, but they have in common one thing: All are by women.
N.O.W. (Not Ordinary Work), launched yesterday, will run for three weeks in July as part of TheatreWorks' Writers' Lab programme and includes theatre, film, exhibitions, workshops and social enterprise.
It is helmed by actress and arts educator Noorlinah Mohamed, who has designed a three-year season for TheatreWorks that will focus on women.
It is the first time the Singapore arts company has done something so entirely female-centric.
Noorlinah, 51, says: "I want to see how far I can go, playing with just women. I've never been in a company of just women, so it's an experiment."
It is not so much a matter of addressing a gap in gender representation in the arts scene, she adds, but of "celebrating the voices present in it, how women work in support of one another".
She and artist Dahlia Osman will be collaborating on an exhibition, Power Of Letters, which will display letters written by women's rights advocates from 1985 to the present.
BOOK IT /N.O.W. 2019
WHERE: 72-13, Home of TheatreWorks, 72-13 Mohamed Sultan Road
WHEN: July 10 to 28, various times
ADMISSION: Various prices
INFO: notordinarywork.com
In a blast from the past, Grace Kalaiselvi will direct Three Fat Virgins Unassembled, a contemporary reworking of Ovidia Yu's seminal 1990s play on female oppression.
Yu, 58, says: "I was pretty scared it would be so dated. But we were almost disappointed at how little things had changed."
That said, Kalaiselvi, 42, notes that sexual harassment has taken a new slant with the advent of technology - from the sending of unwanted photos of genitalia to sexist jokes in office chat groups - an aspect she plans to incorporate in the reworking.
Actresses Yeo Yann Yann and Eleanor Tan will be taking on new roles, as Yeo makes her directorial debut with a reading of Tan's new play, The Book Of Mothers.
"It's nerve-racking," says Yeo, 42. "When I'm an actor, I put on a character for audiences, but this time, I'm presenting to them a house - no, a world."
Family relationships across generations of women also feature in Straits Times journalist Akshita Nanda's debut novel Nimita's Place (2018), which Edith Podesta will direct a staged reading of.
There will be screenings of four films by female directors, including Innocents (2012) by Singaporean Wong Chen-Hsi, a coming-of-age story about two primary-school pupils.
Apotropaic Texts, an installation by poet Marylyn Tan and artist Zarina Muhammad, will explore protective magic and witches or nenek kebayan in Malay folklore.
Comedienne Sharul Channa will hold a 10-part stand-up comedy writing workshop for 18 people, which will culminate in a live show.
"It's one of those art forms where there is no barrier of age, race or gender," says the 32-year-old.
"We need more people talking about menopause, giving birth or working nine to five.
"We need more voices that are different."