REINTERPRETING NATIONAL IDENTITY
In his solo exhibition, Kata Sangkhae probes the nature of Thai identity
As Thailand continues to search for a way out of the black hole of politics, Kata Sangkhae’s latest solo exhibition “Narrative Of Monuments” at Kathmandu Photo Gallery on Silom couldn’t come at a better time. Like the political landscape that we’re faced with today, Kata’s photographs of well-known Thai monuments violate basic rules and regulations. In his conceptual photographs, Democracy Monument is blurred to oblivion — overexposing the shot that renders the now meaningless winged structure into ghost-like figures. Victory Monument, usually standing tall in stature and grace, has buildings and traffic lights intruding into the aesthetically questionable composition.
And most visually captivating of all is the monument of King Taksin the Great on horseback, raising his sabre in pitch black, as if leading an army through darkness and confusion.
The photographs, symbolic to the state of the country today, were taken in daring violation of normal photographic practices and can either inspire hope or despair depending on the viewer. For Kata, as a conceptual artist and doctor of philosophy, he simply wanted to explore his own perception of these monuments.
“The concept first came from my interest in Thai identity, on both the individual and national scale — the official and unofficial identity,” he said.
“Monuments are symbols that talk about nationality and community, and it’s always been stuck in my mind, because when we talk about monuments, we’ve probably walked passed them, we probably know about them, but we’ve never really been there [in that location].”
Surveying different monuments in Bangkok, Kata looked for different meanings and perspectives in these mighty symbols of patriotism.
“What’s interesting is that the city is changing,” he said, “And access to these sculptures are of course going to change. [At the beginning of the project] I took photos in the afternoon. But in the end they didn’t tell the story that I searched for. I found out that at night, the monuments turn into an installation. The changing lights and environment interested me. One thing that’s interesting is that monuments are built to be viewed. But how should they be viewed?”
Born and raised in Thailand and ingrained with Thai ideologies, it was when Kata moved abroad that he started to ask himself what exactly is Thai identity? His artwork, which range from video art, to sculptures to paintings, tend to explore how Thai identity has been politically negotiated and shaped, along with other works relating to urbanisation, tourism, cultural environments and identity problems stemming from changing places and locations.
Hammering his concept further is the red, hard-to-miss metal sculpture placed in the middle of the gallery. Guests have to bend down and squint into the peephole, barely seeing anything but a black moving dot in the distance. We hear through an echo inside the sculpture — an off-pitch, echo-filled rendition of the Thai national anthem. We hear our national identity, but it’s almost impossible to see what it actually is.
“For me, it’s like when I look at the monuments,” Kata said. “There’s a certain distance to it. This is about distance and complexity, about seeing and not seeing. It’s like we listen to the national anthem like a routine, but we’ve never really thought about it — of how we define this society.”