October 2024: As it celebrates its fifth anniversary, the Arnaud Lebecq gallery is pleased to present “Émotions Fugaces”. Kitikong Tilokwattanotai and Jiratchaya Pripwai, two major artists of the contemporary Thai scene, are brought together for an exploratory journey of the ephemeral nature of emotions in abstract and meditative creations.
Collage: a new dimension in the work of Kitikong Tilokwattanotai.
In his new series, Kitikong continues his exploration of the meanders of memory in a work rich in symbols. While the artist is known for his mastery of lacquering, he is also developing a practice of collage.
This new technique echoes a tradition from Northern Thailand, the “Tung”, multicoloured flags used during Buddhist ceremonies. These assemblages of paper and other coloured materials mark the boundaries of sacred sites to invite the local population and then be offered to the deities. Kitikong appropriates this ancestral practice to create works where the material, loaded with history and spirituality, becomes an additional vector of emotions.
Kitikong’s collages are visual stories where the fragments of paper, in various colors, form complex and vibrant compositions. Each collage is an assembly of memories, impressions and sensations, a sort of contemporary mandala where past, present and future merge.
By integrating collage into his lacquer work, Tilokwattanotai invites us to meditate on the notion of time and the permanence of being. The fragments of paper, like memories, are traces of the past that continue to influence our present. By gathering and recomposing them, the artist creates works that are testimonies of the complexity of the human soul.
Jiratchaya Pripwai: Poetry of Emotions
Jiratchaya Pripwai takes us into a world where emotions unfold in lines, colors and abstract shapes, creating an intense visual poetry. Her works, born from an intimate creative process, transform her memories and feelings into a singular and moving pictorial language.
Jiratchaya uses frames and colors to release complex emotions, recording the traces of her experiences without seeking to freeze a final result. This approach reflects a vision of the world where emotion is in perpetual motion, oscillating between memory and oblivion.
Jiratchaya's poem, to be discovered in the exhibition, also reflects this tension between memory and oblivion. Using poetic images: "a blue-spotted butterfly fluttering" - "the cliff of memory and oblivion", the artist invites us to meditate on the fleeting nature of the present moment. Her art, like a breath, captures the moment, sublimates it, then lets it fade away, like flowers that bloom before fading.
In her creations, she questions the very nature of memory, seeking to capture these moments that escape her, while reinterpreting them in a new and soothing form. The artist thus creates compositions that are as many fragments of an inner discourse, offering the viewer a glimpse of her emotional universe. Her work proves therapeutic, allowing her to channel her emotions while sublimating them.
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