Running from June 13 to July 27 and curated by prominent Melbourne-based Thai artist Vipoo Srivilasa, the exhibition is a diverse showcase of performance, painting, ceramics, sculpture, video and installation by five Thai contemporary artists Phaptawan Suwannakudt, Nakarin Aaron Jaikla, Bundit Puangthong, Pimpisa Tinpalit and Somchai Charoen – all now living and working in Melbourne and Sydney.

Articulating multi-dimensional and layered histories, they are emboldened in their shared cultural experience of growing up in Thailand and then relocating to Australia while continuing to develop and refine their artistic practices.

The installation “Silence 1.2.2” by Pimpisa – a queen size bed suspended Shibari-style from the ceiling with black rope – will showcase the transformation of everyday objects into sculptural forms to give the viewer a silent space for contemplation. Her previous work “Silence #1 1.2” was on display at Lake Wendouree, Ballarat for the Biennale of Australian Art last year.

Phaptawan was trained as a mural painter while her father Paiboon Suwannakudt led a team of painters to work for Buddhist temples throughout Thailand during the 1980s-1990s. She has translated her skills into creating the “Elephant and the Bush” paintings.     Completed after her residency at the Arthur Boyd properties in the Bundanon Residency programme, she put together the Australian flora and fauna and the Thai elephant to reflect her move to the Australian society.

Painter Bundit brings together traditional and contemporary iconography creating a cacophony of colour and images. Inspired by traditional Thai painting, pop art and graffiti, he stylistically fuses delicate linework with free form painting and stencil work, creating layered dreamlike worlds full of symbolic references to both Thai and Australian culture.

The courage and confidence to undertake such large scale paintings is well informed by Bundit working as signwriter painting billboards as a teenager in Thailand and previously working as an art director on film sets.

Sydney based ceramicist Somchai creates vibrant sculptures out of slip cast porcelain using ceramic slip cast moulds to give the flexibility to experiment with layering and repeating forms. His “Jaegun” vertical sculpture vases playfully stack arrangements of bold geometric shapes on top of each other.

Some of the bases of vases are black, while brighter colours of orange, blue and greens are used to accentuate the multiple levels of the forms. Variations of the vases come in many colours and forms while some appear to lose their balance midway, tilting over with abandoned glee.

Performance artist Nakarin’s mesmerising video series “Void: uses the movement of the human body through dance to activate space. His work “Void 4.1” combines the belief of Japanese Buddhist philosophy and Thai folk belief in the spirit.

Find out more details at http://www.GrauProjekt.com.

Taking place at InParadiso 3030, in the very heart of Venice’s art district just aside the magnificient Basilica dei Frari, the exhibition explores the female world and the role of women in art and society through the artist’s extreme performances and captures the physical manifestation of manual labour processes undertaken by women in Thailand.

Running until June 30, Kawita’s performance provoke questions about cultural identity, feminism, women’s work, consumerism and lived experiences – classified through a lens of hyper-coloured realism and the intensity of physical versus material composition. Her suite of videos offers a vignette into the physicality and vulnerability of the feminine body.

“Performing Textiles”, which she created while travelling around New Zealand, stems from a journey in Thailand that the artist has undertaken to explore the various textile production techniques in small villages by local women workers. Here, production was often time-consuming, but the quality of fabrics fashioned by these women was superior. Kawita’s body performances gives voice to the work of these women, questioning the way in which work is organised and, in turn, the position of women in society.

However, textiles undeniably have a place firmly embedded in history, and it is this history of textile production – recognised as women’s labour – that has ingrained itself in our culture. Basketry, loom weaving, knitting, crochet and lace-making are all feminine material skills that rendered men unnecessary. As such, Kawita’s practice focuses on valuing women’s everyday work and labour, while offering a powerful examination of social and cultural ways of viewing women’s work.

In her performances, she transforms her body into various textile process tools. Her physical form becomes the embodiment of a spinning wheel or weaving shuttle. As the works progress, her body struggles to compete as the material tool, and thus her form undergoes both psychological and physical metamorphosis, repeating infinitely the movements.

Textiles are linked symbolically to birth, fertility and reproduction. The practice of working with materials connects women’s bodies to the earth. It is a symbol of life and power.

Find out more at http://www.ConcilioEuropeoDellArte.org.

There’s plenty to look forward for the young and the young-at-heart this year as the hit Disney-movie-turned-Broadway-musical “The Lion King” finally comes to Bangkok. It’s being brought here by Scenario and BEC Tero and will start its run on September 14 at Muangthai Ratchadalai Theatre.

“The Lion King” has been one of the most popular stage musicals in the world since its premiere on November 13, 1997 with 25 global productions seen by more than 95 million people Produced by Disney Theatrical Productions, it is the only show in history to generate six productions worldwide running 15 or more years. Performed in eight different languages from Japanese to German, and Korean to Portuguese, productions of “The Lion King” nine productions are currently running across the globe.

Scenario’s Takonkiet Viravan watched the musical back in 1997 on Broadway. At that time, “The Lion King” was being hailed as establishing a new level of artistry for musical theatre thanks to staging, costumes, and choreography reminiscent of the vast savannahs of Africa and its distinctive animal characters.

“I’d watched the animation but had no idea how it would look on stage. Like every other member of the audience, I was thrilled by every scene,” says the musical director.

Back then Takonkiet was busy making TV dramas and had yet to fulfil his dream of producing stage plays. “Three or four years later, I had the idea of bringing the show to Thailand and that was well before I opened the Ratchadalai Theatre,” says the director, who finally opened his own venue in 2007.

The stunning choreography and costumes bring the lionesses alive/Photo by Joan Marcus

But despite all his successes in the intervening years, Takonkiet has never given up on bringing the musical to Thailand.

“They kept telling me that it was so expensive. They would say ‘don’t ask how much you will get from it but how much you will lose’,” says the director, who laid the groundwork by bringing two classic musicals, “Miss Saigon” and “The Phantom of the Opera”.

“It’s a show that gathers and adapts all kinds of artistic performance. It’s not just about acting, singing and dancing but also encompasses puppetry, masks and shadow puppet,” he says of the production,

Based on the 1994 Disney animation of the same name and William Shakespeare’s Hamlet, “The Lion King” is the story of the lion cub Simba who is next in line to be king of the Pride Lands, a thriving and a beautiful region in the African savannah. When Simba’s father Mufasa is killed by his uncle Scar, Simba has to run away. He makes friends with Timon the meerkat and Pumbaa the warthog and later returns to save the animals in Pride Land from his vicious uncle Scar. The musical also features classic songs from the film such as “Circle of Life”, “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King”, “Hakuna Matata” and “Can You Feel the Love Tonight”.

The international production that will play in Thailand is currently on tour in Asia and will stop in Manila, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan before coming to Bangkok.

The main character Simba will be played by young British actor Jordan Shaw who joined the production in March, his first on an international stage. Shaw started training when he was six years old and says seeing “The Lion King” inspired him to become an actor.

“I saw the show three times and each time was a different experience, I was able to absorb different information and appreciate things differently so when I got the job, it took me a while to believe it. It has completely changed my life,” says the actor, who is currently on stage with the show in Busan.

From left: Jordan Shaw, who plays Simba, music director Mike Schaperclaus, Mrazi and Kunene./Photo courtesy of BEC Tero

One of the principal characters is the shaman Rafiki. In the original animation, Rafiki was a male but the character morphed into a female Rafiki when director Julie Taymor brought it to the stage. Inspired by a sangoma, a type of South African faith healer who can channel ancestral spirits, the character is always played by a South African actress as Rafiki has to sing and talk in South Africa’s native languages. Language plays a huge role in the show because it’s what makes it authentic and this is especially true for Rafiki, who serves as the show’s narrator. The character opens the production with the Zulu song “Nants ingonyama bagithi Baba”, which calls for the audience’s attention.

For the upcoming Bangkok production, Rafiki is played by South African actress Zodwa Mrasi, a veteran of the role having played the shamam in the Spanish-language version in Mexico. Amanda Kunene, who also hails from South Africa, plays Nala’, Simba’s lioness partner

“I auditioned twice, the first time when I was still young. ‘The Lion King’ doesn’t teach you only about self-growth and losing a parent, it speaks to all ages,” says Mrasi.

Puppetry and shadow puppets are used to present all kinds of animals in the musical./Photo by Joan Marcus

When “The Lion King” made its debut in 1997, the original director Julie Taymor came up with the idea of using puppet design and masks, placing the latter atop the actors’ heads. She said at that time that she was inspired by her experiences in Indonesia, where she lived for four years. And while the puppetry goes back to centuries-old styles from Japan and Indonesia as well as Thailand’s Nang Talung or shadow puppet, the masks are based on traditional African mask work. The costume design is factored around the choreography and turns the actors into a variety of animals from lions to giraffes and zebras all through the 150-minute show.

A STONE’S throw from the Greek island of Mykonos lies Delos, an uninhabited islet a world away from its neighbour’s glamorous nightlife.

It is there, on an island best known for its archaeological treasures, that British contemporary artist Antony Gormley is showing 29 of his sculptures.

Gormley is perhaps best known for his gigantic Angel of the |North, a 20-metre high steel |work that since 1998 has been |an unmissable landmark in its home at Gateshead, northern England.

A visitor sits next to the statue “Water” by renowned British artist Antony Gormley, part of his exhibition “Sight” at the archaeological site of the island of Delos, a Unesco World Heritage Site./AFP

But this new exhibition – including five works specially created for the event – sets his contemporary work among the remains of ancient Greece.

“It’s an extraordinary responsibility,” Gormley told journalists at the opening.

“It’s an amazing privilege to occupy a site that hasn’t been occupied by a living artist for more than 2,000 years – that’s a bit of a challenge isn’t it?”

The archaeological finds on Delos date back as far as the 3rd millennium BC up to the Hellenic era of classical Greece.

Its Unesco World Heritage listing describes it as an “exceptionally extensive and rich” site, reflecting its past as a cosmopolitan port.

The exhibition is intended as a dialogue between contemporary civilisation and the past, says Elina Kountouri, who heads up Neon, the non-profit that organised the show along with London’s Whitechapel Gallery.

The statue “6 times left” by Gormley stands in the sea at the entrance of the port of the island of Delos in Greece./AFP

A mark of the respect accorded to the site is that none of Gormley’s sculptures have been placed inside the ruins of the ancient sanctuaries of the Greek gods Apollo and Artemis.

According to Greek myth, Delos is where the two gods – brother and sister – were born.

Gormley’s silhouettes in steel have been installed on different parts of the island, which covers only 3.5 square kilometres.

Some can be seen as you approach the island by boat from Mykonos, such as the figure of man standing at the northern extremity of Delos.

Another stands in the water at the entry to the island’s port, a third at the entrance to an ancient site. For Gormley, Delos is “an extraordinary place to think about the human project…”.

And of his exhibition, he says: “For me this is a conversation about time. I think sculpture deals with time in an era (when) nobody has time. “For me, Delos as an island has this light and atmosphere and feeling that it timeless – or outside the industrial time we are living.”

But even if ancient gods are gone, we worship at other altars today, he adds. “I don’t live in a world that is commanded or guided by gods,” he says.

The sculpture “Share” overlooks the island of Delos./AFP

“I live in a world that seems to be ruled by money and I’m trying both to resist that and recognise it.

“It’s been for me a real learning curve: how to listen to the marks that are already here – how to respond to the geology.”

Gormley’s exhibition, “Sight”, runs on the island until October 30.

A NEWLY discovered painting by noted Edo-period ukiyo-e artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) has just gone on display at the Sumida Hokusai Museum in Sumida Ward, Tokyo. The museum recently announced the discovery of the work depicting an itinerant clam merchant.

It is part of a special exhibition titled “Edo Livelihoods by Hokusai” and will be on display until Sunday.

The newly discovered Hokusai painting “Hamaguri uri” (Clam vendor) is the centrepiece of a new exhibition at the Sumida Hokusai Museum. (Courtesy of Sumida Hokusai Museum)

According to the museum, the painting, which measures 94.3cm by 27.9cm, features an Edo Period (1603-1867) street merchant called “botefuri”, who carried fish, vegetables and other wares in baskets hanging from a pole. The man sports a beard and shabby clothes, and is taking a break from his work under a moonlit sky.

The painting is inscribed with a signature that reads “Sori”, the alias used by Hokusai when he was around 40. Based on this and other clues, the painting is believed to have been created in the ninth or 10th year of the Kansei era (1797-98).

The museum came into possession of the painting last year after Sumida Ward purchased it from a commercial art dealer, but details on who owned the artwork before that are unknown, according to the museum.

The museum concluded it to be an authentic Hokusai painting based on its unique style, the signature and other characteristics. It named the work “Hamaguri uri” (“Clam vendor”) because the basket the merchant carries is thought to be filled with hamaguri clams.

According to the museum, Hokusai was born in what is now Sumida Ward. He became interested in drawing at the age of six and went on to produce ukiyo-e woodblock prints and paintings for his entire life.

At around 70, he released “Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji”, a series of woodblock prints that would come to be known as his definitive work and have a major influence on European and other artists.

He is believed to have produced about 30,000 works before his death. The museum owns about 1,800 works by Hokusai and his apprentices.

“Even though he painted characters’ faces with quick strokes, their expressions come through quite clearly. We also hope visitors enjoy reading the information panels accompanying the works at the exhibition,” says the museum’s Maho Yamagiwa.

A craftsmen works on a tub with Mount Fuji in the distant background in this woodblock print from Hokusai’s “Fujimigahara in Owari Province, from the series “Thirtysix Views of Mount Fuji.” (Courtesy of Sumida Hokusai Museum)

“Hamaguri uri,” on exhibit for the first time, is one of several ukiyo-e works by Hokusai and his apprentices included in the special exhibition, which offers a detailed look at occupations during the Edo period.

The exhibition features about 80 artworks that depict common people’s day jobs during the era, from hairdressers and hikyaku mailman that are still well-known today to more unique professions like sellers of “ayame ningyo” – dolls made of iris that were used as decoration – and paper scrap collectors. Accompanying panels offer detailed explanations of the professions and their historical background.

Some of the artworks in the current exhibition will be replaced for a second exhibition to be held from May 21 to June 9. “Hamaguri uri” will only be displayed during the first exhibition. The entrance fee is 1,000 yen (Bt300) for adults.