Farewell to the artist

DOZENS OF THAILAND’S leading performance artists led by Chumpol Apisuk and Vasan Sitthiket staged a series of art happenings yesterday evening at Wat Bangbua in Bangkok’s Bang Khen district.
Clad in black and white, the artists were expressing their grief through body language as they bid a final farewell to Paisan Pienbangchang, one of Thailand’s performance art pioneers.
After battling pancreatic cancer for four years, Paisan died on July 15 at age 54, less than a week after staging a critically acclaimed performance piece at “Instal-Action 30 Years”, a retrospective of Chumpol’s works hosted by the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre.
“Paisan was the first artist to perform at Concrete House in 1993. His last performance was on Thursday, July 9 when he joined me at my show. He was like my brother. It’s a great loss,” Chumpol told XP.
Paisan and his artist wife Jittima Pholsawek were planning to perform in Vietnam, but their art project “Lay Down” will now be put on permanent hold.
“In your life, you always talked about love and peace. You even turned these notions into a performance art project taken from ‘Love and Peace or Else’, your favourite song by U2,” Jittima wrote in the commemoration book for the cremation.
“‘Lay Down’ is our joint art project and is all about peace. We have taken it to many countries and first staged it at the art community in Chatuchak Weekend Market in 2010. We have travelled to Chiang Mai, Yangon, Japan, Indonesia and Singapore.
“This year we were planning to perform in Vietnam, but the founder of the project suddenly took a journey from which there is no return and ‘lay down’ forever,” the widow continued.
Graduating from the College of Fine Arts in 1984, Paisan quickly made a name for himself as a critic, artist, writer and activist, expressing his social-concerns through his body art.
A prominent human rights and environmental activist, he also worked in several different disciplines including visual art and literature. Using props from everyday life, he used both real and fake blood in his performances, and was even known to physically hurt himself when expressing the pain and suffering of the underprivileged.
Paisan, along withhis wife, his younger brother Mongkol, Vasan Sitthiket, Surapol Phanyawachira, art critic Thanom Chapakdee, Sompong Thawee and Manit Sriwanichpoom co-founded the “Ukkabat” group in early 1990s, laying down a firm foundation for happenings and communal public art in Thailand. Among their best known events was the site-specific communal art piece in protest against the construction of the Kaeng Sua Ten dam in Phrae in 1999, and their performance at Asiatopia, an international performance art festival founded by the Chumpol in late 1990s.
At his cremation today, leading Thai artists, singers and poets will sing “Farewell: Paisan Pianbangchang” composed by SEA Write laureate writer Paiwarit Khao-ngam. Happening art will be performed before the cremation. The event starts around 1pm and lasts until 4. The cremation is at 5pm.
At 7pm Singapore time, Singaporean performance artists, musician and poets Jason Lim, Yazuru Maeda. Lee Wen, Lina Adam, Ben Puah Arif Auab and Kai Lam will remember the Thai artist with an installation of memorabilia, live music and performances. Funds raised from the event will support Jittima’s publication of a memorial book to be launched 100 days after his death. The book will be one of the rare performance art books to be published in Thailand.
“The book will feature articles by Paisan, myself and other leading performance artists who have worked with him,” Jittima explains.
More memorials for Paisan continue on Saturday night at 6 when his artist friends will hold “1 Day 1 Show” at the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre. The highlight will be a screening of video archives of Paisan’s live performances.