A HISTORY OF THE DEFEATED
THE EXHIBITION ‘ABSOLUTE PRISONERS 1902’ FORCES A LOOK AT THE SKELETONS THAILAND HAS KEPT IN ITS CLOSET STORY: APIPAR NORAPOOMPIPAT
We believed that Siam unified smoothly and without any problems. No. That rarely happens. Our country usually has this propaganda of everything being OK, but in reality, it’s not
According to every state-approved history book, the unification of Siam in the late 19th to early 20th century was smooth and trouble-free. The tribunal city states, which had a substantial degree of autonomy for centuries, all seemed to abdicate their power willingly and accept the new, centralised system to avoid the spread of European colonisation.
Yet, history is never that simple. Unearthing a set of photographs that records a little-known episode of Thailand’s past, artist and curator Manit Sriwanichpoom drops a bombshell in the exhibition “Absolute Prisoners 1902”, on show at his Kathmandu Photo Gallery.
Stepping into the gallery space, a sense of eeriness hits you. To the right stands an open wooden cupboard, shelved with 16 black-and-white mugshots of shackled prisoners. The only way to get a clear look at them is to shine a torch on each of their faces. It feels invasive and disrespectful, yet with chains around their necks and ankles, the men, either shirtless or wearing traditional tribal clothing, stare defiantly back at you.
To the left, a TV screen held up by chains plays on loop the process it took to resurrect their images. Like emerging spirits, they hauntingly appear one by one as they’re swayed back and forth underneath the translucent chemicals.
At the back of the room lies a chained iron collar; on the opposite wall, polaroids of shackled gallery visitors are crudely thumbtacked on.
“Please, come take a picture!” Manit urged unsuspecting visitors on the exhibition’s opening day. Putting on the chains, the weight of history is literally on your shoulders.
The men, as we learn through the TV installation, were northern Shan (Tai Yai/Ngioaw) rebels, arrested for revolting against the rapid Siamese effort to unify the nation-state during King Chulalongkorn’s reign. At the time, there were about 20,000 Shans residing in Siam as war captives, traders, monks or entrepreneurs in the timber economy. When the Bangkok administration sought more control over the northern parts of Siam and planned to replace their local rulers and princes, a rebellion (of which there are varying accounts by numerous academics and historians like Tej Bunnag or Andrew Walker) broke out in July 1902 in the chiefdom of Phrae. The revolt, as part of which the city was looted and Siamese officials were killed, was met with heavy-handed suppression by Siamese forces — with many Shan rebels and innocents killed during the fighting, imprisoned, or executed. The whole Shan independence movement ultimately ended in September 1903. Another attempt at rebellion did not occur.
Manit, who’s a keen explorer of t he Thai National Archives, found scanned digital files of those imprisoned.
“The National Archive has so many historical photographs,” he said. “But when I found this set, I felt that they had strength. The pictures spoke to me. They reflected a feeling that I had — maybe a feeling that other Thai people have today.”
The National Archive, of course, had absolutely no further information about the pictures, so Manit started digging.
“At that time, I didn’t know they were rebels,” he said. “It was interesting that each and every one of them didn’t look like your average prisoner. From their posture and their eyes, they’re extremely proud.”
“I looked at the characteristics of the photographs and I guessed it to be from the Rama V era,” he said. “And the way they dress, they had to be from a tribe, so I thought about the Phi Boon Rebellion during that time.”
The Phi Boon Rebellion, or the Holy Men Rebellion, was another large-scale uprising which took place in northeast Siam — now Isan. At the same time, there were also uprisings in the southern Malayu states (which is still an ongoing problem today) and the demands of the state were met with passive resistance from many other regions.
The resistance was so widespread that it helped form the creation of Thailand’s standing army and police force today.
“[However,] this wasn’t the way Isan people dressed,” Manit continued. “Then I searched the Ngiaw Rebels and I started finding things one by one. I found an academic who wrote a book about the revolt, so I thought this might be it. I searched a bit more and it talked about arresting 16 people and bringing them to Bangkok. Then I realised, this was it.”
Wanting to connect Thais to their own history, Manit decided to use the 19th century wet-plate collodion process to bring the prisoners back to life. And by putting the photographs inside a cupboard, visitors not only want to know more about their story, but they are literally finding skeletons in a closet.
“What’s interesting is that we, as Siamese, would call them rebels. But they probably don’t view themselves as that…” Manit said. “It’s a story that’s not in mainstream history and we don’t know much about it. We believed that Siam unified smoothly and without any problems. No. That rarely happens. Our country usually has this propaganda of everything being OK, but in reality, it’s not.”
Being face to face with these early 20th century prisoners, the discrepancy from Thai school curricula becomes apparent. History, in Thailand as in any other place in the world, has always been written by the victors. Our perceived reality is only a small part of a bigger picture.
“There’s no popular history, there’s no local history, and it’s quite a pity,” Manit said. “There are many academic theses which masters and doctoral students write, but it doesn’t get publicised, as it might go against the set of ideas of the nation of Thailand. I’ve found so many things in the National Archives that haven’t been used. We don’t invest in knowing more and enough about our history. That makes some people not learn about the mistakes that have happened in the past.”