In The Jam Factory Gallery's current exhibition "Asylum Seeker: The Pond And The Fireflies", artist Prapat Jiwarangsan himself is the asylum seeker, and the pond in question is actually around the house in Chiang Mai in which he took refuge after the 2014 coup. The show is comprised of a video installation, two series of photographs and a few ink-written letters.
"These works were done two years ago in Chiang Mai," said Prapat. "There wasn't any post-coup danger directed at me personally, yet I didn't feel like Bangkok was the best place for artists to live in."
Viewing unguided, one feels that the text on the wall -- how the works are a response to recent political unrest -- is completely irrelevant to the pieces in the show, like the abstract-rendered photographs of the pond or photographs of blurred characters printed on transparent paper. Having talked to the artist, however, it all makes sense. All works, Prapat explained, centre on this pond, which represents "a refuge not just for him but also for underwater animals and illegal migrants who liked to hang out around the area".
In a photography series entitled "Illuminating Unreal", Prapat took photographs of the pond and then submerged the prints into the pond, varying in the length of time for each piece, from minutes to hours, before picking them up and scraping and smudging the surface until they were on the verge of abstraction.
"Through this technique the artist interacts with the transition of place and time, for the prints, once submerged in the pond, transcend their own realm to connect to an otherworldly domain," wrote curator Loredana Pazzini-Paracciani. "Yet once removed from the pond, the prints return to our realm, but altered and no longer one and the same." Also featured in the show are letters Prapat reproduced with pen on paper from emails he'd got from foreign embassies and institutions in response to his letters sent to discuss political detention and the censorship situation in Thailand, requesting advice on seeking asylum in these countries. The letters are so blurry that they are unintelligible in most parts because he had also submerged them into the pond.
For the other photography series entitled "Invisible Shadow", Prapat is more straightforward in addressing the issue of illegal migrants' well-being after a rumour that the military government would take action against unregistered migrants. Not only are the faces of migrants vague because the photographs were printed on transparent paper; Prapat stressed their "unrecognised status" once again by scratching their faces off almost completely.
"There was this young migrant who I used to see hanging out around the pond," said Prapat. "But right after the rumour that the military was going to take action, he was suddenly gone. These people aren't really recognised in our society and they could just easily disappear."
The highlight of the show is a short video The Asylum (Dok-Rak), starring a woman who was formerly a disc jockey at a local radio station who became a taxi driver after the station was shut down by the NCPO. The video shows the woman standing in front of the pond, performing as a DJ and talking and taking song requests from non-existent listeners.
"[The video] wraps viewers in a dreamlike setting," wrote Pazzini-Paracciani. "Where nature alternates with solitary humanity, and alienation becomes the tool to articulate the contradictions and disconnections of Thai society at an important juncture of its history."
"Asylum Seeker: The Pond And The Fireflies" is at The Jam Factory Gallery, Khlong San district, until Sunday.
A scene from video The Asylum (Dok-Rak).
