Art Exhibition: Representing Localities: Memory and Experience

Artists: Rattana Salee and Therdkiat Wangwatcharakul

Dates: 21 February – 21 March, 2015

Venue: Thavibu Gallery

Vernissage: Saturday 21 February 2015 at 5 pm

Curator: Rathsaran Sireekan

Open: Monday – Saturday: 11:00 – 19:00

Thavibu Gallery is pleased to present the art exhibition Representing Localities: Memory and Experience —

showcasing recent paintings and sculptures by Therdkiat Wangwatchakul and Rattana Salee.

In a new series of work, the rising-star sculptor Rattana Salee continues her dialogue with the city she lives in,

though shifting the focus from Bangkok’s aggressive expansion via claustrophobic concrete blocks to thought-
provoking representation of local architectures and domestic objects which hold personal memories. The

painter Therdkiat Wangwatcharakul sets out in this series as a flaneur walking the streets of Bangkok only to

find stray dogs, old vehicles and pedestrians —the experience not available to him when traveling with his car.

Key to these two artists’ rendition of their impressions and memories is the highly mediated representation of

their experience—reminiscent of Bertolt Brecht’s ‘distancing effect’ (Verfremdungseffekt)—unique to them as

practitioners of their media.

Rattana Salee (b. 1982), a holder of a MFA in Sculpture at Silpakorn University (2011), marked her debut

solo exhibition with Shell(Shocked)—the atmospheric sculptural installation comprising metal and plaster

architectural structures which reflect the private and communal complexities of urban living—at Thavibu

Gallery in 2010. Among other grants and awards, she was a recipient of the French Embassy’s scholarship to

study at École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts (ENSBA), Paris, France, in 2011.

Therdkiat Wangwatcharakul (b. 1971) graduated with a Master in Painting from Silapakorn University in

2003. He often paints with oil on aluminium sheets and also with oil on canvas. The use of aluminium makes his

play with light and shadow unique. Typical to Therdkiat’s spatially sensitive compositions are his minimal uban-
scapes. In Bangkok Station at Thavibu Gallery in 2010, Therdkiat refrains from earlier architecturally aligned

works to spotlight the daily rituals of the capital’s inhabitants. Therdkiat has participated in several exhibitions in

Thailand, as well as in Singapore (2001), Japan (2003), the Netherlands, Korea, Spain, and USA (2006). He was

awarded the Jurors' Choice Prize in the ASEAN Art Awards in 2000.