Cover Visually impaired theatre-maker Claire Teo performing in the first staging of ‘Monstress’ in March 2025 (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
Visually impaired theatre-maker Claire Teo performing in the first staging of ‘Monstress’ in March 2025 (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
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The artist and educator reflects on embedding access into the creative process—and building a more inclusive future for theatre
The first question in Monstress is deceptively simple: what do you see? Its second carries greater weight: what do you choose to see? For Claire Teo, seeing extends beyond sight. It is assembled through sound, language, memory and the perspectives of others. “Sometimes it may be about seeing through other people’s eyes,” says the visually impaired theatre‑maker. “And that forms my vision of the world.”
That way of perceiving shapes Monstress, a co-production between Esplanade – Theatres on the Bay and Art:Dis Singapore, a non-profit organisation working at the intersection of arts and disability. The play follows Mei Ling, a blind girl who moves next door to Melissa, a single mother, and her son Sam, who is autistic. Their lives intersect amid HDB corridors, schooling pressures, transport systems and domestic strain. Teo’s concern lies in the systems around them: habits that turn discomfort into distance, and silences that allow harm to gather unnoticed.
The work began during a two-year incubation process with a prompt to transform myths into local stories. Teo chose Medea and Medusa, drawing links to survivors of sexual crimes and burnt-out caregivers. Research changed the course of her debut play. “The stories and the characters went on their own journeys,” says Teo, who also works at a girls’ residence caring for young women who have experienced trauma. After encountering reports about disabled children killed by their caregivers, she looked beyond individual culpability. “This show is about holding everyone involved accountable. And not just the caregivers, but the systems that we live in.”
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Above Accessibility features such as creative captioning are woven into the work’s language (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
Accessibility features such as creative captioning are woven into the work’s language (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
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Following its first staging in March 2025 at the Art:Dis Bukit Merah Black Box, in a version written with playwright Jean Tay, Teo rewrote the play. Conversations with caregivers, educators, law enforcement officers, persons with disabilities and young people informed the new text. “This is an entire community story,” she says. “It’s made up of so many people’s truth.”
For the Esplanade staging, Teo returned to structure, testing where scenes sat, what each line implied and how audiences might interpret Mei Ling and Melissa. Earlier responses had reduced the work to a comparison of suffering. Teo recognised that accuracy depended as much on form as content. A scene placed too early or a phrase weighted too heavily could tilt audiences towards an unintended conclusion.
The same rigour extends to access. In Monstress, embedded narration, creative captioning and a relaxed environment form part of the work’s language. Descriptive information is folded into dialogue; amplified movement makes gestures audible; captions move across the set rather than remaining fixed at its edge.
Movement presented a particular challenge. When Singapore-based Australian director Yvan Karlsson asked how she wanted to experience the work, Teo answered plainly: “I want to experience movement that I can hear.” Gestures, objects and sound cues were examined for what they communicated. Access shaped the writing, direction, design and performance from the outset.
Above Also joining Teo (pictured left) for the Esplanade staging are Oon Shu An (centre) and Syarifuddin Sahari (right) (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
Also joining Teo (pictured left) for the Esplanade staging are Oon Shu An (centre) and Syarifuddin Sahari (right) (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
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The set also changes how Teo inhabits the stage. Tracks built into its design allow her to navigate independently. “I used to count steps. I used to try to find the light on my face—feel the heat,” she says. “That takes away from the character because so much pressure is on me to be in the correct spot.” Certainty releases her attention. “I can just focus on my character and what I’m trying to say.”
That freedom carries particular significance after her training at Lasalle College of the Arts, where she was the first visually impaired person to graduate from its Diploma in Performance programme in 2019. Teo entered an environment where classes had yet to be planned with a disabled student in mind. “[I was receiving] maybe about 60 per cent of the information being shared,” she says. The shortfall forced her to identify her needs quickly, articulate them clearly and rely on teachers and peers willing to listen.
Lasalle taught her that access requires a shared vocabulary, and that inclusion rests on mutual understanding. She learnt to ask for descriptions of movement, space and gesture; others learnt to provide them. That experience informs the rehearsal rooms she wants to create, where access is built into the process, collaborators remain curious and every contribution carries weight.
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Above Teo was the first visually impaired person to graduate from Lasalle College of the Arts's Diploma in Performance programme in 2019 (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
Teo was the first visually impaired person to graduate from Lasalle College of the Arts's Diploma in Performance programme in 2019 (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
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For Teo, this is where care becomes method rather than sentiment. “Care, as a practice, is about listening first,” she says. In rehearsals, sighted guidance, verbal description and collaborative adjustment become part of the process. Close listening strengthens the work and fosters a more collaborative environment.
Her practice spans theatre, film, installation, music and text. Sometimes the medium comes first, as it did with Through The Looking Glass, an installation presented as part of Light to Night Festival Singapore 2025. Other times, the story determines its form. For Monstress, care has meant rewriting until the work says precisely what she intends.
It has also meant creating opportunity. Writing has allowed Teo to develop work she believes in while giving her a platform to act and perform. Her ambition reaches beyond accessible performances towards equal artistic possibility. “I want there to be no more distinction between disability arts and mainstream arts,” she says. Her dream is for people like her to be cast in mainstream productions.
Monstress imagines that future, in which access becomes part of the work’s creative language, care shapes the way it is made, and lived experience opens up new possibilities for theatre. Teo hopes audiences leave more attentive to one another—and more willing to build a world in which fewer people are overlooked.
Above ‘Monstress’ reimagines a future where access becomes part of the work’s creative language (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
‘Monstress’ reimagines a future where access becomes part of the work’s creative language (Photo: Art:Dis Singapore)
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As Senior Editor of Tatler Singapore, Hashirin champions and refines the storytelling across platforms—curating and crafting compelling profiles, cover stories and features that spotlight visionaries shaping culture, business and impact. Driven by curiosity, she draws inspiration from the artists, changemakers and trailblazers she encounters through her work. Beyond the pages of Tatler, she is an avid supporter of local theatre and delights in seeking out art in every city she visits.
