'Some people asked me why I didn't paint Lord Rama [Phra Ram from the Ramakien epic] green," said 88-year-old Aree Soothipunt in his husky voice, pointing to his abstract painting from the late 70s of a blue-skinned Rama.
"The literature never specified that he was green. Anyone who said he's supposed to be green can walk off," he quipped as his former students around him laughed.
Inside the secluded fourth floor exhibition space of the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre, Aree Soothipunt, National Artist, mentor of countless art students and a pioneer of abstract painting in Thailand, was being shown around his first-ever solo exhibition called "Outside In", created and dedicated to him by his former pupils.
For a respected artist and teacher, it's surprising that this is Aree's first solo show -- at the age of 88. "My work is my students," he said. It's this unassuming attitude that perhaps delayed Aree's long-overdue show.
And yet as a man who's committed his whole life to creating trailblazing art and shaping the next generation of leaders and thinkers without taking any credit, it was only natural that his students would want to give back -- to show who it was who essentially paved the way of Thai contemporary art.
"It's an exhibition which displays the works of a master," said Pollavat Praoattong, Aree's former student and curator of "Outside In".
"However the essence of it isn't about hanging a painting up and saying, 'Here's what the master did; here's how he's so talented; here are the miracles of his works'. No, it's not like that. We're trying to show how much he has contributed to society."
On display until Sunday, May 13, are more than 50 pieces of Aree's rare artworks as well as detailed texts describing how the artist created and reflected upon his pieces. Walking into the exhibition space, visitors are first faced with a brief timeline of the history of Thai art. Opposite that is a row of art tools hung on canvases, ranging from a credit card to a squeezy bottle, all taken from Aree's home studio to show his experimental nature with art.
Further into the exhibition, you face Aree's largest and game-changing abstract masterpieces, Women 2503 (1960), Junkyard (1961), and Chicken Hole Prison In Lao (1966). Full of raw strokes, movement, colour and emotion, Aree's proto-abstract paintings were something of a revolution from the mainstream fine arts disciplines that were taught in Thailand during that era.
"At the time Thai artists were still drawing and painting like those from the 19th century," said Pollavat. "But in 20th century, there was a new movement of art from the US. Aree was the one who pushed this. For me, I call it the 'American School'. If anyone from Silpakorn University [Thailand's oldest and most traditional art school] saw what he did, they'd go, 'What the heck is this? What are you doing? This is not in the system'. Basically no one knew how fast the world had already gone."
Aree was one of the first Thai citizens to win a US scholarship for a master's degree in fine arts in the early 60s during the abstract expressionism boom when artists such as Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Robert Rauschenberg and many others threw the art scene into tumult with their rule-breaking sensibilities. Aree soaked it up and returned to Thailand with a fresh set of ideas and set up a new art curriculum in 1968 at the Prasarnmit College of Education, later Srinakharinwirot University.
His new educational style, which ran parallel to traditional fine arts schools, celebrated critical thinking, perception, otherness, freedom and democracy, and pushed new ideas about the role of art in Thai society. He called the new programme tasanasilpa, or visual arts, separate from the mainstream vichitsilpa, or fine arts. No more were the arts reserved for only those with "god-given skills", but it should be accessible to everyone. Ordinary people can and should create artworks as well, not just the so-called "artist". Simply speaking, he lowered art down from highbrow culture to something simple and accessible for the general public to understand.
"Art is born from visual experience," Aree said. "Experience is responding to the perception of a person."
Continuing with the second section of the exhibition, visitors get to see how Aree went against the Thai traditional fine arts school with his abstract nude paintings (which he calls "COLLIWOSPA": colour, light, woman, space) as well as his stunning abstract temple paintings.
Linking nude paintings with a democratic culture, Aree believes if society is able to be more open, understand and debate each other, nude paintings can also be created and accepted. As for his abstract temples, Aree created new meanings and forms in established Thai iconography, believing that a new Thai identity needs to emerge by looking back at the roots while being open to new ideas.
Mainly painting in watercolour -- a material that wasn't considered a legitimate medium of art at the time, Aree thought it was a simple, direct and relatively inexpensive medium that could be accessible to anyone who wanted to get into the arts.
Visitors then reach the climax of the show: a large wall filled with 11 paintings in various styles ranging from abstract Thai dancers to beautiful temples, lit with moving, dramatic lights. Within the same room is a collection of Aree's books, again to give the general public access to the art world.
"In the 60s there were barely, if any books about art at all," explained Pollavat. "People who understood or knew anything about art had to study in schools or universities, and they had their own special language of their own. However, Aree created a massive amount of art publications. It quenched everyone's thirst for art. They could just now read and learn."
The question though, is why? Why has the artist never given credit to himself, never had a solo exhibition, and doesn't even refer to his artworks as his life's achievements?
"Do you know what the teachers of Prasanmit say?" he said, referring to where he taught. "Start where they are, not where I am. It's very child-centred. If it's about the government, you have to take care of the people, not government officials. That's democracy. That's all it takes. Respect towards others. I respect my students."
And how does he feel that his students had finally created a solo exhibition for him?
"See," he chuckled. "It starts with them."
Aree's nude series from the late 1970s onward, which he calls COLLIWOSPA (colour, light, women, space). Photo: Apipar Norapoompipat
Aree Soothipunt, 88, at his home studio. Photo courtesy of Bangkok Art and Culture Centre
Aree's mixed media painting after the 2014 coup d'état. He comments: 'Happiness is a personal experience, you cannot return it to another.' Photo: Aree Soothipunt
