An army of artisans have laid down their paintbrushes, chisels and pigments after three years of painstaking work to create a true-to-life replica of renowned Stone Age cave paintings long hidden away in southwestern France.

“Absolutely all the work you see on the wall has been engraved, worked and sculpted, chiselled by hand, with little paintbrushes and sometimes even tools used in dentistry,” says Francis Ringenbach, the artistic director of the project to replicate the 18,000-year-old Lascaux cave paintings.

The meticulously faithful copy of what has been dubbed the “Sistine Chapel of prehistoric art” is now ready to be transported one segment at a time – 46 all together – and installed just down the road from the original at a site semi-buried in a hillside in Montignac, in the Dordogne region.

The International Centre of Parital Art, 150 metres long and nine metres high, designed by Norwegian architectural firm Snohetta, will open by the end of the year.

The nearly 2,000 Upper Paleolithic wall paintings depicting rhinos, horses, bison, deer and panthers make up Europe’s most important collection of prehistoric art and were inscribed on Unesco’s World Heritage list in 1979.

The caves, discovered in 1940 by four teenagers, quickly became a massive tourist draw, with around a million people flocking to see the work of the oldest known modern humans, who came to Europe from Africa via Asia.

Authorities closed them to the public in 1963 out of concern over the danger posed by humans to the delicate micro-climate.

A limited set of reproductions have been on display in Montignac since 1983, while Chicago’s Field Museum hosted the first exhibit outside France of copies of the paintings last year titled “Scenes from the Stone Age”.

The 57 million-euro project to replicate the entire set has married cutting-edge technology with a desire for the utmost authenticity in the reproduction.

Ringenbach, himself a sculptor, says the need to be as faithful as possible to the original slowed the team down.

“Sometimes one has to spend hours reproducing just 10 square centimetres,” he says.

The artists benefitted from 3D digital scans of the original paintings that were projected onto the walls, creating a task akin to using tracing paper as they applied layer upon layer of natural pigments.

Chief painter Gilles Lafleur says of the original works: “We try to understand them really, to understand how and why they were painted this way.”

But he admits that “time has taken its toll and these animals don’t look the way they would have when they were painted. Time has had a visible impact, so we must also recreate that.”

Ringenbach says he doffs his cap to the talent of our ancient forebears who only had rudimentary tools to create their masterpieces.

“They were extraordinary technicians, reproducing animal likenesses from memory with their highly vivid movements,” he marvels.

Reproducing the originals is, he says, a “magical” feeling.

Whereas the smaller-scale original museum could give only “limited insight” into the site’s significance, “here, we reach a whole new level in terms of helping people to understand what Lascaux represents for science, the history of art, prehistory.”

Japan’s elaborate all-male kabuki theatre is heading to glitzy Las Vegas for a series of shows, part of a bid to spread the classical Japanese art form to a global audience.

Film and theatre company Shochiku says it will present the Japan Kabuki Festival in May in Las Vegas. It will include a new play “created specifically” for a theatre in the desert gambling and entertainment centre.

Kabuki is a form of traditional theatre that has been performed since the 17th century. Though women appeared in the beginning, kabuki shows came to be all-male affairs combining dance, drama and music with men playing female roles.

The actors, scions of families of kabuki performers who usually begin training in childhood, don elaborate costumes, wigs and heavy makeup for performances on equally elaborate sets.

“It will be a new step for us in our policy of creating fresh plays that match modern tastes while retaining classic works,” Tadashi Abiko, Shochiku’s vice president and chief of its theatre business, told reporters.

The new play, “Shi-Shi-O” (“The Adventures of the Mythical Lion”) will have seven performances over five days from May 3 to 7 at the David Copperfield Theatre at the MGM Grand for about $200 (Bt7,000) per seat, Abiko said.

It marks the first time audiences will pay to watch kabuki in Las Vegas following free preview performances last year.

The move is also part of Shochiku’s strategy to attract inbound tourism that is expected to increase with Tokyo’s hosting of the Olympic Summer Games in 2020, company officials said.

Since the first performance abroad in 1928 in Russia, kabuki has been seen numerous times in foreign countries but repertoires were usually works from the classical canon, Abiko said.

The featured performer, Ichikawa Somegoro VII, also starred in the preview last year. He said he wants to use the performance to demonstrate traditional techniques such as flying across the stage and quick costume changes that are mainstays of kabuki. But he also aims to use non-traditional techniques such as video as well as fire and water. “I have set a goal this time of kabuki taking root in Las Vegas as an entertainment form.”

A young Laos man whose modelling talent was discovered on the catwalk in Vietnam will be taking to the international stage this year to promote the fashion of his homeland.

Saysettha Keophilavan, 25, currently pursuing a master’s degree in foreign relations in Hanoi to add to his bachelor’s degree in international politics, has been described as having the perfect body for modelling and the perfect height of 183 centimetres. Several clothing brands in Vietnam have hired him.

Laos’ profile in show business and other fields has soared in recent years, its artists’ popularity extending to neighbouring countries. With the fashion scene burgeoning in Laos, Saysettha was inspired to return home to help promote Lao brands both locally and abroad, bringing with him the experience gained in Vietnam.

One clothing manufacturer, the Fashion House, had him touting its snazzy “Men Folder” line. Saysettha next teamed up with First Modelinglao for his debut as a model in Laos and is now setting his sights further afield, envisaging a career in couturier fashion and possibly in entertainment as well.

First Modelinglao founder Viengsamone Chittarath spotted saw Saysettha’s pictures on Facebookand Instagram and four months ago persuaded him to work for the brand.

One promotional event was the recent premiere of the Lao film “Above It All” at the National Culture Hall in Vientiane. Saysettha met several celebrities from various fields, which inspired him to continue in the fashion scene and perhaps venture into other areas that would further raise his public profile. He’s now considering modelling for local magazines to gain wider recognition.

Viengsamone sent Saysettha’s portfolio to the Malaysian organiser of the Mr and Ms Culture Asia contest coming up in Kuala Lumpur in June and October, with models from the 10 Southeast Asian countries participating. Saysettha hopes to be one of them.

Viengsamone is backing Saysettha every step of the way and hopes his fellow Lao will follow his success story as he goes international.

Responding to the rapid expansion of non-verbal performance and cross-boundary trends in performing arts, the London International Mime Festival (LIMF) now includes circus arts, puppetry/animation, masks, comedy and clowns, as well as mime, movement and visual theatre, although some works would fit in more than one category. And even though verbal expression is limited, silence is not the golden rule. LIMF also holds screenings of classic circus films “Trapeze” and “The Circus” in addition to various workshops.

It is however important to bear in mind that “pantomime” has a different meaning in the UK than elsewhere and as such, pantomime, a Christmas tradition, doesn’t belong in this festival.

At the Soho Theatre, London-based New Zealander artist Trygyve Wakenshaw is entertaining the audience until this Saturday, with his solo work “Nautilus”. With long limbs, a rubber face and a strong background in both theatre and mime, he is not only cracking jaw-breaking jokes in short skits of various lengths most of which concern chickens cats and cows, but also offering a look at the world from another perspective. The audience gets to laugh as much as to think and many might even decide to opt for a vegan lifestyle.

At Jacksons Lane Theatre in North London, Glasgow-based physical theatre artist Al Seed’s solo work “Oog” puts the audience right into a different world – that of a soldier who has been through the misery of war and is becoming less human as a result. Complemented by Guy Veale’s eerie soundtrack and a bleak set, costume and lighting design, Seed’s movements are slow, oftentimes repetitive yet powerful.

But the highlight of my first LIMF experience has been British circus theatre company Ockham’s Razor’s “Tipping Point” at the Platform Theatre on the campus of Central Saint Martins. Seated in an arena stage set-up surrounding the stage, the audience – those in the front row are less than a metre from the stage actions – witness a unique ensemble of two female and three male performers. They have co-devised this 70-minute awe-inspiring work with immense creativity and considerable humour and perform coherently with one another with sheer trust, high discipline and tremendous playfulness. With different body types and sizes, they know how to assign each member to a certain task that involves performing on and with the metal poles, some of which are hung from the rig above while others are held up on the floor by the performers. These poles themselves have various functions and become another group of characters, thanks to our imagination.

Held by the performers, who swing it around in the opening scene, white powder pours out of a pole defining the circular performance space. In the final scene, white powder also pours out of a pole that’s hung from the rig, but it swings as if freely and the pattern makes the stage look like a painting.

Just like another exemplary work of nouveau cirque, “Tipping Point” is more than circus skills and simple thrills.

And in a month when the London weather offers little sunlight, lots of rain and even occasional snow, LIMF is sizzling, reconfirming that theatre can mean more without spoken words and proving that there’s much more on the London stage than West End musicals.

The writer wishes to thank Arthur Leone PR’s Emma Hardy for all assistance.

LOUDER THAN WORDS

• The London International Mime Festival continues until February 6. For details, check, http://www.MimeLondon.com.

Posh Italian luxury brand Dolce and Gabbana recently demonstrated that Islam’s strictures on women’s attire don’t have to curtail a sense of fashion, and three Thai labels have more proof if needed.

D&G’s gorgeous black and golden-beige abaya (cloak) and hijab (headscarf and veil) were a hit in much of the Arab world. Now – with so many Middle Eastern tourists visiting Thailand – Theatre, Tube Gallery and Tango have produced magnificent outfits for Muslim men and women replete with their typically immaculate handcrafting.

Sirichai Daharanont, who founded Theatre 30 years ago, says his Middle Eastern clients are “big spenders” – “Sometimes a single sales slip can top Bt100,000!”

“We’ve seen them more frequently over the past three or four years. Every time they come to Bangkok they’ll drop into the shop because they know we’ll always have something new for them.”

Sirichai doesn’t design clothes specifically for Middle Eastern customers, “but I think they like my style, which uses high-quality fabrics in loose, long A-line dresses with lots of glittery handcrafting and embroidery.

“These are suitable for any occasion, casual or formal, and both the standard size and oversize models have a comfortable shape. And, since the clothing tends to be quite loose, mothers might buy several outfits for their teenage daughters.”

In public, Islam’s devout female followers usually wear a loose black robe covering the body from head to toe, leaving only the hands exposed and sometimes the face. Underneath is another garment reaching from neck to toe that’s revealed in private company or when the women assemble by themselves separately from the men. Unlike the necessarily plain abaya, this dress can be quite colourful and elaborate.

“My Thai female customers like this style too,” Sirichai says, “not for any specific purpose but just in case they have a special party to attend or even for when they go to the seaside. The dresses are easygoing, yet glamorous and coquettish, with lace details or embroidery along the hem and dramatic draping.”

Sirichai adorns the men similarly, in shirts and jackets with scintillating details in the fabric or in the embellishments.

Saksit Pisalasupongs and Phisit Chongnarangsin of Tube Gallery ship attire to leading stores in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. They’ve been building up a customer base in the Middle East ever since participating in a trade fair in France years ago, says Phisith.

“The fashion market is quite distinct and targeted by many high-end designer brands. Arabian women need very specific clothing – loose yet sophisticated in the crafting, with semi-couture styles for eveningwear. They like the darker shades like black, dark blue and purple, as well as gold.

“In some countries the gown must be long enough to cover the feet, but they’re still surprisingly fashionable and up-to-date on seasonal trends. When European women started wearing midi skirts, the women in the Middle East did too – whereas Thai women will have to wait another season or two.”

Though Tube Gallery leans towards edgy ideas, Pisith says he normally includes long dresses in his eveningwear collections. “The design shouldn’t focus too much on the petite figure because every women is concerned about her shape.”

Tube Gallery’s current autumn-winter line, “Passage through the Lost Town”, takes its cues from the simpler lifestyle and architecture of Luang Prabang in Laos. It features an embroidered push-up pattern to create dramatic bulges. The luxury elements include not just rich texturing but also accessories such as a large golden belt that can be matched with a golden tank-top evening dress. The overall look is simple in structure but luxurious and refined in the artistic details.

Also attracting buyers from the Middle East is 20-year-old Tango, which has a franchise boutique in Al Ain, Abu Dhabi. Kanvara Pechdasada’s meticulous craftsmanship in exotic leather deserves much of the credit, says her daughter Nongwinee, who’s a rising designer.

Tango’s current winter collection features intricate hand-embroidering and a bold use of ribbons and one-off pieces such as python-skin bags. Rusty gold predominates, straight out of a Gustav Klimt painting, complemented by contrasting bright pastels.

“Our bespoke leather handbags and shoes became popular here and in Japan first and then in the Middle East,” Nongwinee says. “With a partner and a boutique there we’re able to understand Arabia women’s tastes and preferences better.

“They like expensive and high-quality materials, like exotic skins, and a fine attention to detail. Tango’s original designs and the sense of ‘wearable art’ match their tastes. The women want to look distinguished, so when they take off their modest covering robes – at teatime, for example – they want something outstanding that reflects their personality, maybe crystal embroidery.

“We also make specific adjustments on request, such as the length of the strap or a larger handbag,” she says. “We make two versions of the dresses – a shorter one for Thais with maybe a wider split-cut and longer one for Middle Eastern women.”

Now in his 60s, the beloved comedian has never had as much fun in real life as the characters he plays in films. In fact there’s been precious little that was funny in recent decades, thanks to endless financial problems. He hasn’t gambled away his earnings or anything – he’s just made a lot of bad investment decisions.

Last year Thep bottomed out, the fiscal aggravations driving a wedge between him and his wife of 35 years, Passarawan (“Joom”). They were fighting all the time and finally broke up. He decided, yet again, to try something new, this time a food-cooked-to-order outlet near Mahidol University in Salaya, Nakhon Pathom, called Khrua Khun Thep. He even took a course in baking at a polytechnic college.

It turned out that Thep could whip up a dandy version of khanom pia, a sweet Chinese-style pastry. His fans, visiting the shop, discovered this talent and quickly spread the word. Suddenly Thep had more business than he could handle.

And here’s the best part: Thep’s success brought Joom and their kids around for a visit a few months ago. The former husband and wife discussed matters and decided to become husband and wife once again.

Joom began helping with the khanom pia trade and soon enough Thep let her take over the day-to-day operations. Now they’re sharing a rented house right opposite the food shop and piling up the pastry proceeds. A second branch is in the works for the Nawamin area.

They still fight, Joom says, but, asked if they’re apt to ever break up again, she grins and answers, “Well, I guess not.”

James’ 70-year-old sweetie

A female fan wants to give hunky actor Jirayu “James” Tangsrisuk land and house worth more than Bt1 million. Pretty sweet, huh?

There are no strings attached either – except for the “dis-cord” being plucked by the fact that the fan is 70 years old.

Thongbor Suwanajan of Yasothon has been crazy about James Jirayu for years, ever since he made his television debut in the drama series “Suphap Burut Jutathep”. She has a huge collection of pictures of him clipped from magazines. She loves him, she says, like a member of her own family.

So when are they going to meet and sign the transfer papers? Well, we don’t know – not because James thinks this is an insane idea but because Thongbor has disappeared. Reporters have staked out her home and she’s nowhere to be seen. They talked to a neighbour who seriously doubts that Thongbor has any property to give away. And they were also told that Thongbor was going around last year telling everyone that James was her actual son.

James meanwhile is being polite about the whole affair. In France for Paris Fashion Week, where he’s doing a little runway modelling for Japanese clothing brand Yoji Yamamoto, he says he’s grateful for Thongbor’s devotion and wishes her health and happiness, but he won’t make any mention of the land and house.

Thai art will have a much bigger canvas this year as more museums, galleries and smaller spaces for “alternative art” open across the Kingdom. Give thanks to the private sector, which is footing the bill for all the new venues.

We have a longer wait than anticipated, however, for the opening of the Asean Culture Gateway, a Bt900-million museum being erected as part of the Culture Ministry’s new headquarters compound on Ratchadaphisek Road. It will be Thailand’s first such facility dedicated to contemporary art.

The first phase of the Gateway was expected to open mid-year, but problems arose with the contractor, says Apinan Poshyananda, the ministry’s permanent secretary.

“The ministry building and the museum are 70 per cent finished, but now the ministry will have to have another round of bidding to find a construction firm that can finish the project before the Prayut administration’s term ends. Hopefully we’ll open the office building by the end of this year.”

Meanwhile the bulk of the ministry’s collection remains in storage, and training continues for museum managerial staff.

“The ministry has more than 700 works of modern and contemporary art,” Apinan says. “This year alone the Office of Contemporary Art Department will spend Bt21 million buying new works and my office will add Bt10 million more.” He and his team are off to Singapore this week to view the new Bt13.7-billion National Gallery there.

It’s not as though we have no art to admire while the government sorts out its predicament, though. Private citizens are keen to share their collections with the general public.

The bulk of the anticipation rests with the Mai Iam Contemporary Art Museum, scheduled to open on July 3 in Baan Ton Pao in Chiang Mai‘s Sankampheng district. This unassuming locale a 15-minute drive from the city and the airport is where Eric Bunnag Booth and his parents – Patsri Bunnag and stepfather Jean Michel Beurdeley of the Jim Thompson silk firm – are preparing a 3,000-square-metre facility.

They’ll have on view their own holdings of more than 600 artworks, amassed over the last 25 years, and the grand opening will feature a retrospective on celebrated filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul.

Prominent architecture firm allzone, led by Rachaporn Choochuey, designed the museum, which boasts a 40-seat cinema, a workshop for educational programmes, a library, a restaurant and a gift shop.

“Our main objective is to have a permanent collection of contemporary Thai art on display at all times over 1,300 square metres,” says Eric.

“In no way does our collection represent the whole history of Thai contemporary art – it represents just our own point of view, based on the sole criterion of the emotional response the works give us. A work of art exists as a result the artist’s creativity, but also in the emotional response it produces in the viewer.”

Along with video installations by Apichatpong, the family also collects works by Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook, Pinaree Sanpitak, Vasan Sithiket and the late Montien Boonma.

The Mai Iam will add additional colour to the northern cultural hub already vibrant with arts and crafts. Chiang Mai became home a couple of years ago to private collector Disaphol Chansiri’s museum, located in the city itself, with works by Andy Warhol, Jeff Koons, Yoshitomo Nara, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Chatchai Puipia and Montien.

“Mai Iam means ‘brand new’,” says Eric, “and in our case it refers to Chiang Mai – ‘new city’ – and to my great-grandmother’s aunt, Chao Chom Iam, to whom the museum is dedicated. The dialogue between old and new interests us very much, and you encounter it all the time in Chiang Mai.”

Jumping from North to South, in August Klaomas Yipintsoi and her photographer-husband Nopadon Kaosam-ang will open Misium’s museum in downtown Songkhla.

Set in a gathering of well-preserved old houses, Misium’s takes its name from the late Misium Yipintsoi and will show her works that have long been stored at the Misium Sculpture Garden in Sam Phran, Nakhon Pathom. Her granddaughter, Klaomas, decided to relocate some of the works after one of them, “Coy Girl” – the piece Misium was working on at the time of her death in 1988 – went missing at the end of 2014.

Klaomas and Nopadol have spent years restoring the venerable buildings in the compound and occasionally organise art shows and concerts, much as they formerly did at their About Studio/About Cafe in Bangkok’s Yaowarat district. That spot in Chinatown was a pioneer in Thai contemporary art in the late 1990s.

Misium’s in Songkhla will open with a Navin Rawanchaikul solo exhibition, complete with a site-specific installation.

Also in the capital, towards the end of the year, Bangkok University president Petch Osathanugrah will unveil the Bt100-million Art Warehouse on Ramkhamhaeng Road. A place to house his collection of more than 500 works, the ultra-modern building is designed by Pitupong Chaowakul of Supermachine. He is the recent winner of the grand prize in annual awards sponsored by the London-based journal Architectural Review. The honour was bestowed for the 10 Cal Tower that Pitupong dreamed up for SCG. Pitupong’s other creations include the iconic Diamond Building at Bangkok University’s Rangsit campus.

The art warehouse covers 2,000 square metres on a four-rai property near Rajamangala National Stadium.

“While we’re waiting for my O Museum to be completed on Rama IV Road sometime in the next few years, this warehouse will serve to display my collection,” Petch says. “We’ll also have a studio for which I’ll be hiring a foreign conservator to make repairs to the pieces as needed.”