Following Jim Thompson Art Center's Cold War exhibition series "Shadow Dancing: Where Can We Find a Silver Lining In Challenging Times?" is a second chapter, which depicts the socio-political, economic and cultural scenario of Taiwan and Thailand in the post-World War II period.
Besides expanding the network between these two countries' art communities, this follow-up exhibition features a new production of contemporary installation art to advocate the value of compassion, connectivity and conversation between curators, artists and specialists, including audiences.
"In 2020, we launched the 'Challenging Time, Artists And Curatorial Exchange, And Research Residency Programme', a four-month online discussion between Thailand and Taiwan. After that, Jim Thompson Art Center and Hong Gah Museum in Taipei continued this programme by selecting eight Tawainese and Thai artists to create multidisciplinary, experiential and participatory artwork, including performative video art and sound installation," said curator Paweena Nekamanurak.
"We also tried to connect artists and experts for research and art development. However, we were uncertain of how to make this possible during the pandemic. So, we named it 'Shadow Dancing', which means we are dancing in the dark," she added. In fact, this title is derived from the concept of movement in the dark as a dynamic as opposed to explicitness and righteousness.
Since we are living in a complex, multi-faceted world where no one can see things clearly due to Covid-19 uncertainty, 'Shadow Dancing' invites the audience to uncover the micro-narratives of Asian history and culture. It also alludes to Taiwan's historical events and its geopolitical position, including the ongoing social and political situation that has cast a dark spell over Thailand.
Starting with his sound installation The Tutorial and Climate Barbarians, Ang Enkaryon, a Tawainese artist collected old Thai films and audio clips to create a new sense of sound and language that explain the close relationship between climate change and other global phenomena.
Moreover, Ang is passionate about the phonetic system and the current global crisis. He primarily applied two concepts of sound symbolic and Thai poetic rhyme with an infinite loop technique to establish a set of sci-fi, hypothetical images, which challenge the viewers' perception.
Fascinated by Jim Thompson's community engagement and his vision for local craftwork, Tseng Yen-Yu deconstructed, re-assembled, and transformed her clothes and Thai silk fabrics from Thompson's company into marionettes in the mixed-media installation Kindness to narrate local history and culture.
With her expertise in wrapping and tightening techniques, this Taiwanese craftswoman usually makes puppets from delicate textiles, antique garments and defective fabrics to reflect her personality and surrounding. She believes that these materials have a soul and a story that expresses the relationship between human beings, society and the environment.
Inspired by the Hollywood movie The Beach, and the scene of two protesters swimming in Thailand's parliament, Cheng Ting-Ting explored utopian ideologies and created a single-channel video with a large world map called Paths To Utopia. In fact, this Taiwanese artist usually examines and reinterprets cultural, national and racial identities through her interactive installations, which range from images, sound and video to live performances and games. In this way, she visualises Phi Phi Island as an unreachable destination.
Although many tourists and Thais consider this island a paradise, Cheng attempts to urge that paradise is not always what it seems and persuades her audiences to contemplate how today's realities defy our expectations and vision of the future.
Another Taiwanese creator, Lin Yi-Chun researched the role of street hawkers in Thailand after noticing how the Thai CIA responded "rapidly and creatively" to the 2020 pro-democracy movement. She also looked into Taiwanese street vendors' history by observing how they survived in the metropolis.
Seemingly, her mixed media installation with the two-channel video Stand, Sit, Stay or Elephant Exercise Preparation invites viewers to sit in ready-made chairs and seriously consider the difficult life of a hawker as well as the repercussions of capitalism and politics.
Meanwhile, Panachai Chaijirarat explored the notion of extra-territorial space and further investigated military housing in Taiwan since this Thai artist is interested in the US military in Asian nations. He also came across a chronicle of the Kuomintang's 93rd Army division, China's lost army in the remote village of Mae Salong and later found out that some Kuomintang soldiers successfully moved to Taiwan, while others still live in Northern Thailand.
Mae Salong's early history centres around the Golden Triangle's opium trade, in which the Chinese army was involved, and it inspired Panachai to transform coffee beans with a fascinating mix of fibre cement, bronze, copper, and ceramics into mock-ups of historical and cultural artefacts. These objects, displayed in his cabinet-like installation (Dis)guise, delineate post-cold war history, taking audiences back to their provenance.
Another Thai artist, Sornrapat Pattharakorn re-studied the history of educational institutions, including the dynamic between power and ideologies for his creative artwork Parenthesis or Echoes Impact Crater By A National Banner after becoming intrigued by pro-democracy protests and their struggle for freedom of expression.
On the back of his wooden sculpture Parenthesis, Sornrapat wrote historical narratives of the Siamese 1932 revolution and the White Terror in Taiwan with chalk. Additionally, the creator allows visitors to edit or erase his writing, and to add sliver postcards on the wall to complete and turn his art piece into a full-scale sculpture of dialectical truth.
Drawing his inspiration from Japanese idol girl group AKB48 and its international sister groups, including BNK48 and TPE 48, Chunlayarnnont Siriphol's video installation Alliance Of Nippon Girls 48 or ANG48 represents the prevalence of Japanese culture or soft power in Asia in the post-World War II era.
In this experimental artwork, Chunlayarnon employed moving images from collective film archives and put female protagonist "Angsumalin" from the classic love novel Khu Karm as a model of loyalty and love for the motherland to question traditional beliefs in virtue and idealism.
Similarly, Kridpuj Dhansandors, a family physician created the short film Limbic Release after learning of the clash between alternative medicine and medical science as well as the power relations in local communities.
After the group exhibition, he plans to organise a film screening at local clinics and schools in Northeastern Thailand so people understand and reconsider colonisation and the consequences of globalisation.
This exhibition is on the view until June 5 at Jim Thompson Art Center. For more information, contact at jimthompsonartcenter@gmail.com or artcenter@jimthompsonhouse.com.
