When walking around Kamin Lertchaiprasert's installation Nothing Special, one enters a meditative state comparable to the one experienced by the artist as he was sculpting the 364 ceramic bowls used for his piece.
Art is a spiritual practice for Kamin, whose exhibition "The Timeless Present Moment" closes on Sunday at MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum in Chiang Mai. A catalogue was launched last weekend.
This retrospective, also curated by the artist, features works from two important periods of his life -- his debut, between 1979-1988, and his later works, spanning from 2008-2016.
At the beginning of his career, Kamin's artistic endeavours were fuelled by his questions on the meaning and value of life and art. Today, at the age of 52, he speaks with confidence of the answers he found.
"For many years, I tried to reach perfection until I realised that everything is perfect as it is," he said. This epiphany brought him greater artistic freedom, allowing him to cut loose from audiences' expectations.
After practicing Buddhism for several years, Kamin became captivated with Zen philosophy in 2008 and was introduced to Shunryu Suzuki's works.
A Beginner's Mind, Suzuki's collection of writings, was inspirational to Kamin's 364 teabowls installation, which he created in 2014.
"According to Suzuki, a beginner's mind has infinite possibilities, while the mind of an experienced man is limited, as it only wants to achieve perfection," the artist explained.
Kamin is more interested in the process of making art than in the final result. For him, the production of these tea bowls -- he sculpted one per day, during a year -- was no different than his practice of meditation.
At first, he wrote a word on each bowl and pondered about its signification. The word's meaning and the bowl's shape would be tightly connected.
However, as he progressed, he freed himself from his obsession about the object's form or beauty, which made him lose focus. He accepted that there was no right or wrong and allowed the unexpected to set the course of his work.
After the 277th bowl, he stopped inscribing words on them.
"I figured out that it made no sense to write the word 'emptiness' on the bowl as I meditated about its signification," he added.
Kamin's interest in focusing on the present moment had already taken shape in another project, when, in 2012, he took up cycling as a form of meditation.
"I appreciated every moment and everything that happened. Every moment that I was cycling was my destination," the artist wrote.
Exhibited together, Kamin's earlier and later works are engaged in a dialogue, reflecting both his personal and artistic evolution.
"Eventually, all my works are about the same thing. It's come full circle," he adds.
Saying this, Kamin points to his oldest painting on display -- All Is Vanity, a 1979 acrylic painting -- and his 2010-2011 series of sculptures -- Birth, Aging, Sickness and Death. Both pieces open and close his retrospective.
We Are All the Same.
