Thanom Chapakdee: Ubon Agenda, Khon Kaen Manifesto and MAIELIE
Thanom Chapakdee is an art activist, critic, curator and educator. In 2018, he launched Khon Kaen Manifesto, a bi-annual art festival that aims to decentralise the contemporary art scene in Thailand, complemented by Ubon Agenda in 2020. We speak to Thanom about his interventions, and plans for the two festivals in 2022.
Manifesto took place from 10 to 20 December 2020 in Khon Kaen. Earlier, you held Ubon Agenda, a sister festival in November 2020 in Ubon Ratchathani. How did you select the artists’ works in these festivals? The intention was to organise artistic practices, activities and workshops around the Kong-Chi-Moon Rivers in Northeastern Thailand, and they had these names: Manifesto, Agenda and Summit (MAS). We believe that anyone can become an art practitioner without necessarily being an artist. The focus is not on being an artist, but participating in the space of artistic action and being an artistic activist. Therefore, the idea of “choosing” or selection does not apply. Anyone with the courage to present their ideas is welcome as long as it relates to the context of the site and the festival’s main idea. MAS is concerned with socio-political, cultural or environmental problems, and its approach is aligned with the concept of Aesthetics of Resistance and Aesthetic Revolutions. Could you talk about artworks shown that made a deep impression on you, perhaps for how it encapsulated the aims of the festivals, or the strength of the concepts? There are many examples of works which I believe can raise questions. I will speak about a few works presented in Tang Jai
From The Periphery
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