Katong Rojak (Makan series)

This work is a print of an original hand-built collage, composed from Ketna’s own photographs taken across the street food cultures of Asia. It forms part of her Makan series — “makan” meaning food in Bahasa, the language widely spoken across Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia — a word that carries with it not just eating, but gathering, sharing, and living.

Spanning over two decades of living in Southeast Asia, the imagery travels from ceremonial fruit offerings in Bali to Bhel-Puri carts in India, from the floating markets of Bangkok to satay served on banana leaves in Malaysia, weaving through Indonesia and Singapore. Katong — a neighbourhood in Singapore famed for its Rojak (mixed salad) — anchors part of this visual journey, grounding the work in lived, local memory.

At its core, this piece is an archive of the street as a living museum. Not the sanitised version found in guidebooks, but the raw, sensory theatre of everyday life — where food is not just sustenance, but spectacle, ritual, commerce, and community.

In the background, fragments of floor tiles, food carts, traditional copper water heaters, and Indian tiffins quietly hold space — objects that carry their own histories. Each image becomes a gateway to memory and tradition, layered with food signage, newspaper cuttings, and wrapping paper to evoke the sheer emotional energy of the street.

It captures a world that is rapidly disappearing, as air-conditioned malls and homogenised urban spaces quietly replace these vibrant ecosystems.

Ketna’s lens asks a simple but urgent question: what happens when the street — with all its sounds, colours, improvisations, and human exchanges — fades from memory? And what do we lose when food is no longer a shared, public performance, but a packaged, private act?

This is not just an artwork; it is part of a larger, ongoing archive — a deeply personal and culturally significant documentation of street life before it slips away.

Each Fine Art Print is titled, numbered and signed in Ketna’s handwriting.

Depending on each composition’s ‘personality’, colour spectrum and destined geographical location, the Artwork is printed either as a C-Type print on Fuji gloss paper or as a Giclee print on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper. (For humid countries e.g Singapore, C-type Fuji paper is advised as it is does not let moisture and mould through)

All Prints are made at the most accredited and reputable Printing studios in London, Singapore or New Delhi, using the best quality fine art archival paper available.

The studio meticulously keeps account of each numbered print, including when and who it was sold to, so there is no chance of duplication.

Each Fine Art Paper Print comes in an edition of 50, so for the three sizes, the total prints ever made will be 150.

Each Metal Print comes in an edition of 25, so for the three sizes, the total prints ever made will be 75.  

Each Acrylic Print comes in an edition of 10, so for the three sizes, the total prints ever made will be 30.

For each composition, there are up to 5 Artists Proofs for colour and production quality checks. The total edition for each artwork is therefore 260.

Each Print is made to order. Please allow 10 working days for delivery.