A room full of mystery

A room full of mystery

Canadian-based Thai artist Amornthep Jaidee on his debut exhibition in his home country

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
A room full of mystery

When you walk into a room inside the white colonial house, a bed dominates the empty space. Instead of a mattress, you see a bunch of cacti in different shapes and sizes. Amidst the green thorny plants are four hand sculptures placing in different spots on the bed; they seem to be giving a sign to the living things trapped in one place.

This is an installation by Amornthep Jaidee, a young Thai artist who is now based in Canada. While completing his master's degree in fine art, the native of Chiang Mai has returned to Thailand for his debut exhibition at H Gallery.

For the past few years, Amornthep has focused on working with found objects and installation pieces that explore the diversity of queer culture.

His exhibition at H Gallery is called "A Room At The End Of The World", which adapts its title from a novel by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Michael Cunningham (A Home At The End Of The World), where Amornthep created a room that confronts us with the secrets, memories and desires that are usually hidden behind closed doors.

We talk to the 30-year-old artist about his first show in his homeland.

Tell us about the background of this exhibition.

I am always interested in the issues of sexual identity and queer culture.

In this exhibition, the idea of using cacti as a material has a reference in the phallic soft sculptures used by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. This installation represents the anxiety of sexuality that especially focuses on the gay community. I want to talk about the hooking-up of gay men, which brings them fun yet also a risk of catching diseases _ as you can see, the bed is full of thorny cacti. Also, I place sculptures of Buddha's hand gestures. I believe this particular hand gesture means intellectual debate.

I decided to turn this room into a bedroom. Usually the doors are closed, but I opened them all and put lace curtains on to make it look like a comfortable bedroom. Curtains also represent the idea of existentialism, about the outside and the inside.

So the show title "A Room At The End Of The World" came after you completed the work?

Amornthep Jaidee.

A Room At The End Of The World is the idea of my curator [Brian Curtin, a sometimes contributor to Life]. He named it for me. At first, I wanted to call it "Dialectic Desire", but the name we've picked is much more appropriate because it goes with the work, which we installed in a room at H Gallery.

You earned your art degree in Canada and are now studying a master's degree in art. Why Canada?

I moved to Canada over 10 years ago. I was studying computers in my hometown, Chiang Mai, but I didn't finish the degree.

Then I decided to go abroad and I chose Canada. When I first moved there, I started working and also taking courses. I did general studies and art courses. It was the photography class that got me interested in pursuing my study in art. Finally, I applied for a bachelor's degree in fine art at the University of Lethbridge. Last year I just started my master's degree in fine art at Concordia University in Montreal. Last year I just started my master's degree in fine art at the University of Lethbridge. In the beginning, my works were in photography and multimedia, but later I became interested in installation and found objects.

Your previous works, as well as this one at H Gallery, focus on queer art. Why is that?

I am a gay man, and gay-related art is my personal interest. I want to know more about gay history and the studies on this topic. As I study art, I put my personal interest about queer culture into my own works.

Do you have any favourite queer artist?

My works are usually inspired from the work of Felix Gonzalez-Torres. He's an American-Cuban artist. He's known as a minimalist. One of his famous works is the one where he placed a pile of candy in the gallery, which audience members were allowed to take away.

What is the art scene like in Canada?

I live in Montreal now and the art scene there is very happening. There are art festivals all year. There are various types of art, but electronic and multimedia art are the most popular.

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