Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon “Untamed Melody -Tokyo”

Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon
“Untamed Melody -Tokyo”
January 17 – February 21, 2025
Reception for the artists Friday, January 17, 17:30-19:30

GALLERY SIDE 2 is pleases to present Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon’s first solo exhibition in Japan, “Untamed Melody – Tokyo”.

Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon’s solo exhibitions “Untamed Melody Part 1 and Part 2” is currently on view at Four Seasons Hotel Art Space MOCA Bangkok and at MOCA Bangkok. Both shows are curated by Rirkrit Tiravanija. Part 1 portrays people from various backgrounds, thoughts, habits, and mindsets, each having roles in shaping our world. These portraits reflect the abilities of the human mind which has the potential to both create and destroy. Part 2 expands this idea and incorporates installation and sculptures. The installation work which shows the portraits and sign boards on top of waste field, examines excess in our contemporary lives, turning the waste into a vessel to think of our environment and behaviours.

Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon was born in 1959 in Patani Province. He arrived in Bangkok to attend Silpakorn University and soon after he graduated in 1984, his abstract paintings were well received earning a solo exhibition at Bangkok’s National Gallery. Puengkasemsomboon’s layers of colors, lines and forms that were inspired by Rothko, Pollock and de Kooning are fresh and alive. However, he did not stop there. For Puengkasemsomboon, art was something without borders. Much closer to Tao or Zen that connects to everyday experience. Not settling into one style or medium, Puengkasemsomboon has started to use found objects in his works, finding beauty in everyday objects. He would talk to junk truckers to spare him some steel remains, picks up branches and driftwood, plastics and glasses. With them, he improvises. The combinations of colors, shapes, and textures of found materials initiate Thaiwijit’s art work. He creates not only paintings but sculptures and functional objects such as vases, stools, lamps. When visiting Thaiwijit’s studio and adjoining home, the whole environment is his art work. We are reminded traditionally the art and life are not separated in eastern life. All the dualistic lines, such as private and public, life and death, abstract and representational, become meaningless in Puengkasemsomboon’s work. All leads to nothingness or becomes one, with nature, self, others, everything around us.

The exhibition at GALLERY SIDE 2 will consist of portrait drawings, masks and signboards. We Look forward to seeing you.

Thaiwijit Puengkasemsomboon
Lives and works in Chiang Mai
1959 Born in Patani Province, Thailand
1984 Silpakorn University, Bangkok