State of the arts: Improving

The Thai art scene came up short on megawatt memories this year, but in the dimness there were five men glowing hot with the power to move minds and shake opinions.
 
PRATCHAYA PHINTHONG

Pratchaya Phinthong continues to cause ripples overseas. A member of the As Yet Unnamed collective, the 37-year-old bases both his art and life on Buddhism, but reaches out to criticise the “politics” of contemporary art and art institutions.
Trained in Germany under Tobias Rehberger, Pratchaya could have taken up residency in a Paris gallery, but instead went to work among Thai labourers on a Swedish berry farm. The result was the critically acclaimed show in the French capital about immigrant issues, “Give More Than You Take”.
Some of those works were in his subsequent show “The New of the Day, The Problem of the Hours” at the Bangkok University Art Gallery, but Pratchaya was back among the labourers, this time the motorcycle-taxi squad out front of the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre.
Anyone phoning those guys to pick them up or riding around with them got to hear recordings of various artists talking about art. It was a mobile education for many.
Pratchaya has 2012 shows lined up at New York’s New Museum, Documenta 13 in Germany and the Asia-Pacific Triennial in Australia, and he has buyers all over the world – though hardly any here.

APICHATPONG WEERASETHAKUL

The champion of the 2010 Cannes Film Festival continued to spread his wings in other art fields this year. “Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives”, Apichatpong’s movie that won the Palme d’Or, inspired an acclaimed installation exhibition called “Primitive” that was seen this year in New York, Yokohama and ultimately the Jim Thompson Art Centre, where it continues into February.
The 41-year-old artist, who initially studied architecture, is also preparing for Documenta 13, along with Pratchaya and Araya Rasjarmrearnsook. And he and Rirkrit Tiravanija have formed the Film on the Rock Foundation to raise money for Thailand’s first “cinematheque”, an art-house theatre in Chiang Mai whose stated goal is to promote freedom of expression in the arts.

ARIN RUNGJANG

Another member of As Yet Unnamed, 36-year-old Silpakorn University graduate Arin Rungjang is riding the new wave with conceptual works based on his personal memories about art and life.
“Unequal Exchange/No Exchange Can Be Unequal”, presented at this year’s Singapore Biennale, turned a former airport office into a home furnished by Ikea where Thais living or working in Singapore could live.
Arin and Kornkrit and Pattara Chanruechachai put on a show called “Bangkok Density” in Florence, Italy, in which Arin delved into recollections of his

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 TOP FIVE THAI ARTISTS OF 2011
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parents, and at Srinakharinwirot University’s new gallery g23 he offered “How should I explain it? It’s like history keeps repeating itself”, a Mother’s Day tribute to his late father and ailing mother.
The New Year will find Arin at the Sydney Biennale, exploring the socio-politics and anthropology of minorities living in that city and in Rwanda.

CHITTI KASEMKITVATANA

Chitti Kasemkitvatana spent eight years in monk’s robes at a Chiang Mai forest monastery before returning to art with a pair of well-received solo shows.
His spiritual journey played out in “Tomorrow was Yesterday” at the Jim Thompson House’s William Warren Library. It featured a game of Hide and Seek to underscore life’s illusory nature, which still lets you grasp the essence of things, sometimes in quite sudden and surprising ways.
The minimalist installation “Fall Silent/Mysterious Flights” at the H Gallery emphasised that we live our lives “in between”. Mirrors reflected both the interior architecture of a colonial-style house and occasional bursts of performance art as visitors discovered an ideal abode for meditation.
A teacher by profession, 42-year-old Chitti regularly shares his knowledge of art and life at the Warren Library and on Facebook, and his home-studio doubles as a gallery for his students.
With Pratchaya Phintong he put together Messy Sky magazine, an edition of which is now on view and on sale in a Paris gallery. You get a wooden binder and, inside, the address of a website. Both exterior and content will change with future issues and have much to do with the purchaser’s own perceptions.

THASANAI SETHASEREE

Chiang Mai University art lecturer Thasanai Sethaseree applies “art intervention” to the world’s troubles. The Chiang Mai University PhD is known for being provocative in his classes, on Facebook and even in the street.
He’s an “intellectual situationist” – which means he conducts “happenings” – and his targets include our prehistoric educational system, unfair politics, social structures and all that nonsense you see artists getting away with.
Thasanai organised a “very happening” protest at the Democracy Monument on December 17 over the hefty jail sentence given to Akong, convicted of l