Excellence, Grants & Distinctions

Student Awards, Competitive Funding & International Recognition

International Creative Tech Honors: Ars Electronica 2026

Taking the World Stage: Echoes of the Bay Earns Acclaim at Ars Electronica

Under the strategic direction and academic supervision of Associate Professor Natalia Grincheva, Echoes of the Bay emerged as a flagship participatory VR installation produced by LASALLE’s Culture Futures Lab to commemorate Singapore’s 60th anniversary. Guiding BA Arts Management students to co-design the project under the artistic leadership of VR artist Benedict Yu, Prof. Grincheva’s mentorship transformed student learning into an internationally celebrated, practice-led research initiative.

Supported by the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth's Our Singapore Fund and key cultural partners, the project empowered local multicultural communities as co-creators. Through participatory workshops, sixty personal migration narratives were translated into 3D digital vessels floating within a virtual archipelago. Reaching over 500 visitors at the Singapore Night Festival and Singapore Design Week, this living archive inspired real-time audience contributions.

The project gained swift international acclaim, presented at the 2025 Meaningful XR Conference at UC Davis and the 12th International Digital Storytelling Conference in São Paulo. Taking the global stage at the 2026 Ars Electronica Festival, Echoes of the Bay earned a prestigious Honorable Mention in the Campus Exhibition at the University of Arts Linz. Aligning with the festival’s theme, NEGOTIATING HUMANITY, the installation utilized a triple-modality architecture—combining a Virtual Archipelago, an interactive Shipyard, and physical "Letter Boats" with handwritten reflections—to reclaim digital tools for empathy, minoritized knowledge, and communal meaning-making.

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National Grants & Sustainability: National Youth Council

Student Leadership and NYC Grant Success in Wear It, Share It!

The student-led initiative Wear It, Share It! stands as a powerful testament to how emerging arts managers can drive tangible environmental action by securing competitive national funding. Spearheaded by BA Arts Management student Daniel Antonio D'souza and a dedicated student team, the project successfully secured the prestigious Young Changemakers Grant from the National Youth Council (NYC). This competitive endorsement enabled the students to transform fashion from a fast-fashion commodity into an active, community-wide ecology of sustainable exchange.

Integrated into LASALLE’s Rock and Indie Festival 2026, the multidimensional event featured a 1,000-piece Clothes Swap with The Fashion Pulpit, an interactive recycled-fabric Pawprint art installation, and an upcycled denim workshop with the Singapore Fashion Council. Through this participatory framework, the student team diverted 85 kilograms of clothing from potential waste—saving an estimated 2.9 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions—and collected 55 kilograms of garments for Red Cross Singapore. The Pawprint installation continued to engage audiences at the Ngee Ann Kongsi Library during the 2026 LASALLE Show period. This initiative highlights the power of student agency, demonstrating how young arts leaders can leverage major grants to curate meaningful, eco-conscious community practices.

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Regional Digital Innovation: ASEAN-ROK Metaverse Finals

ASEAN-ROK Youth Metaverse Idea Contest in Busan, South Korea

Securing Regional Recognition at the ASEAN-ROK Youth Metaverse Contest

Demonstrating how arts management students can lead in tech-driven fields, a LASALLE student team mentored by Associate Professor Natalia Grincheva secured third place out of 48 regional teams at the ASEAN-ROK Youth Metaverse Idea Contest finals in Busan, South Korea. Competing primarily against computing and IT students, Year 2 and 3 undergraduates Lim Yan Bing, Carla Castle, Angelina Ang, and Lionel Fong represented Singapore with their proposal using extended reality (XR) to preserve indigenous cultural heritage.

Their winning project juxtaposed tangible artifacts with intangible oral traditions, creating immersive virtual environments to forge emotional public connections while facilitating institution-community collaborations. Beyond the competition, the delegation participated in field studies across UNESCO World Heritage sites in Gyeongju and lectures by leading archaeologists. The experience reshaped the team’s perspective on digital innovation, transitioning them from tech-skeptics to critical advocates who evaluate technology not as mere spectacle, but as a meaningful storytelling medium. By balancing rigorous studies with international competition, the students forged vital cross-cultural networks across ASEAN, proving that arts managers possess the critical agency needed to mediate between technological innovation and cultural preservation.

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Government Tech & Media Grants: IMDA Delegation to GITEX Global

Mediating Art and Technology: Securing IMDA Support for GITEX Global in Dubai

Under the strategic mentorship of Associate Professor Natalia Grincheva, BA Arts Management students secured a prestigious grant from the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA)—a remarkable milestone that funded their travel to Dubai for GITEX Global, the world’s largest tech showcase. Securing competitive support from a national digital agency underscores the recognized value of empowering arts management students to engage directly with global technological innovation.

Attending specialized workshops, industry panels, and high-level networking forums, the students gained firsthand insight into how emerging technologies intersect with creative ecosystems. The experience revealed a crucial industry gap: while the technology and cultural sectors often operate in silos with limited mutual understanding, trained arts managers are uniquely equipped to bridge the divide. By navigating both technical capabilities and creative curation, the students realized their vital role as interdisciplinary mediators who can guide the ethical, impactful integration of technology in the arts. This IMDA-funded initiative highlights Dr. Grincheva’s commitment to providing students with high-level professional opportunities, equipping them to confidently position themselves as future-ready leaders in a rapidly evolving, tech-driven global landscape.

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