BackAs Yet Unnamed…
A generative resource network for contemporary artists in Bangkok
| Submitted by | Vishnu Charoenwong (painting/installation) Disorn Doungdow (installation) Suwicha Dussadeewanich (sculpture) Kornkrit Jianpinidnan (photomedia) Thakol Kao-sa-ad (painting) Pratchaya Phinthong (conceptual/installation) Arin Rungjang (conceptual/installation) Sylvain Sailly (new media/print/installation) Kata Sangkae (sculpture) Charit Supaset (painting) Naweeya Tangsakul (administrative/curatorial support) David Teh (writer/curator) Montri Toemsombat (performance/installation/photomedia) |
Background
This project grows out of a long discussion amongst a group of Bangkok-based artists. While they work in a wide range of media – from conceptual and installation art to painting, sculpture and photomedia – what they share is place, history and a determination to continue their practice here, despite the lack of support structures for contemporary art. These artists enjoyed the first stage of Bangkok’s contemporary art awakening, receiving their first opportunities in the vibrant experimental scene of the 1990s. Most were participants in the exhibition As Yet Unnamed [Not yet in progress] (at Project 304, 1999), from which this project draws its title. Since then, however, the development of venues and organizations has stalled. Contemporary art remains invisible to most of the city’s people. With the country’s recent political chaos comes yet another return to conservatism and conformity in the arts. Nevertheless, these artists forge ahead with their work, determined to maintain their alternative – and often critical – perspectives on contemporary Thai society.
At the same time, artists have begun to take advantage of new media and online social networks to promote their work, discovering the advantages, but also the limitations, of these mainly commercial channels. In the absence of independent arts organizations, who will build the independent channels to nourish and support artists’ practice? The only foreseeable answer, for Bangkok, is for the artists to build it themselves.
We believe that our art emerges from our communities and our society, and must therefore be addressed to that society, starting with our close relationships, at the ‘village’ level, then carried beyond to the wider public. While it may be necessary, for various reasons, to develop our practice as individuals, we believe that art should not be produced and presented on an individual basis only.
Project description
As Yet Unnamed is a generative resource network for contemporary artists, a kind of peer-to-peer network – functioning both online and offline – designed to strengthen and concentrate their knowledge, profile and resources. As Yet Unnamed is not an institution in the making. Nor is this proposal about funding exhibitions. The artists will simply carry on their practice – and keep showing their work – mustering and sharing institutional, commercial and personal resources as best they can. Meanwhile, As Yet Unnamed will provide a support structure around and between their activities. The collective goal is not to promote individual artists, but to help focus the energies and attention of the city’s art community, and facilitate the sharing and extension of its resources, knowledge and audiences.
The project also anticipates looming difficulties for emerging artists, given the dearth of independent spaces in Bangkok where experimental art can be adequately presented. Not only are the existing institutions weak and slow moving, but art’s own horizons have expanded beyond the gallery walls. As Yet Unnamed recognizes that museum/gallery shows are no longer the only place for contemporary art. The project will support contemporary art’s extension across other contexts and media including publishing (print and online); site-specific projects and art in public space; events, education and other community-embedded activities.
To these ends, the project’s first goal is to establish sustainable channels of communication on two interconnected levels: face-to-face, through education, public programs and the project office (About Studio/About Café); and online, primarily through the project’s website.
1. Project Office
The As Yet Unnamed project has secured the valuable support of About Art Related Activities (AARA). This independent organization was crucial to the early development of alternative and experimental art practice in Thailand, largely through operating About Studio/About Café, a key node in the contemporary art scene for many years. AARA has agreed to make this space available for use as our project office. Once established with basic office equipment, the project office will function as a base for all As Yet Unnamed operations. Apart from administration, the space will play host to workshops and educational programming; exhibitions; roundtable discussions, talks by artists, critics and curators; and collaborations between artists and other professions. It will also function as an editorial office for publications. Informal gatherings – already being held fortnightly – will be continued in the manner of a salon, where artists may present and discuss their practice and research. Guest curators, artists and others will be invited to contribute to the discussions.
All decisions about programming and other uses of this space will be made on a collective basis by the artists. Although exhibitions may be staged here, the program will not be dedicated to promoting their individual practice.
2. Project Website (www.asyet.org)
In keeping with our emphasis on practice rather than P.R., the As Yet Unnamed website will be designed with the primary objective of helping artists to communicate and document their practice, across various levels of audience:
a) self-reflection (documentation; reflection and research on projects past, present and future; b) with each other (resource sharing and collaboration); c) with the wider art community, in Thailand and through their international networks (via collaboration, workshops, lectures and mentorship, through university art schools, etc.); d) with their communities of interest (non-artist collaborators, professionals and communities); and e) with the general public.
While it will provide a much-needed online documentation platform and a dynamic public interface, the site purports to be a generative network for resource sharing, discussion and research amongst Bangkok’s emerging artists. Artists often rely on technicians and designers to promote and document their work. As Yet Unnamed seeks to minimize this dependence by equipping artists with basic skills of online content management, and fostering collaborative (rather than plainly commercial) relationships with design professionals where possible.
3. Web Skills Development
As Yet Unnammed… will work towards the development of the artists’ own web skills. Pending the availability of further funding, we will stage a 3 – 4 day workshop for artists (early-2009), conducted by an I.T. specialist with art-world experience, to train the artists in the use and maintenance of a chosen content management platform.*This platform will allow artists to construct profiles and upload resources relating to past, current and future projects; as well as offer research, reflections and critique on their own, and each other’s, practice, giving rise to visual conversations and collaborations. Other artists and thinkers may be invited to contribute; and resources relevant to the public may be made available for download and comment. The objectives of this initiative are thus:
- to build a channel for resource-sharing, collaboration and peer-review amongst Bangkok’s emerging artists;
- to consolidate artists’ web and documentation skills and build a sustainable archive of their practice, accessible by the public; and
- to encourage artists to experiment with networked media in both the development and presentation of their work, in conversation with their peers and other interested parties.
* Probably an online Content Management System (CMS), a program that allows many users to manage their digital resources (text, image, A-V and multimedia) in a single online environment. CMSs combine a flexible database with a user-friendly web interface; users can manage their resources collaboratively or individually. Many popular CMSs are free, open source programs, meaning that once developed and customized for a particular community, they can be passed on to other communities with similar needs.
Beyond the core establishment goals of the office and website, the first stage of the project (1 year, commencing April, 2008) will comprise two public program elements.
4. Print Publication
The specific aim of this component is to address the chronic lack of professional documentation for emerging artists in Thailand. Rather than a catalogue, limited (like most Thai art publications) to specific events or exhibition outcomes, this document will be more like an almanac or expanded group portfolio. Each artist’s current and recent practice will be documented, and extended with creative material designed specifically for the print context. It will also include critical writing – in Thai and English – by Thai and international critics and curators, grounding the artists’ work in the historical and contemporary contexts of Thai society, art and culture. This publication will draw on the archives, conversations and experiments generated by the website. Production will commence in January 2009, with a launch planned for March. It will be only partially funded by the ANA grant; further support is being sought from local sponsors.
5. Lecture Tour
As Yet Unnamed will also ‘sponsor’ a series of artists’ visits to universities across
Thailand, targeting in particular art programs in under-resourced universities. Using the website as a visual springboard, artists will give presentations and lectures about their work, grounding it in the contexts of art history, and of Thailand’s contemporary sociopolitical reality. But the exchange will be two-way: each visiting artist will ‘adopt’ a regional student (or group of students), inviting them to contribute to As Yet Unnamed… in the form of online documentation or collaborative projects. The goal is to educate, but also to potentiate ongoing relationships and mentorship.
Visits will begin in mid-2008. Where host institutions cannot meet all the costs of a visit, As Yet Unnamed will provide small amounts (up to $200) to help cover the artist’s transport, materials and accommodation. These visits will serve a number of purposes. First, they will create an awareness of the project through a network of arts education institutions in Bangkok and other provinces, the breeding ground for the next generation of emerging artists. Second, through lectures and workshops by artists – at no or low cost to the institutions – they will expose students to innovative ways of thinking about, organizing, developing and promoting their art practice. Third, they will foster a spirit of mentorship, recognizing that the artists’ role and responsibility – within their profession and their society – includes teaching and encouraging future artists, even though most are detached from the formal education sector. And finally, they will allow the artists to reflect critically on their own practice, by transposing and explaining it outside of the more cosmopolitan context in which they typically work and exhibit.
Longer-term objectives
As Yet Unnamed may go on to stage exhibitions in the future, but its first stage will be dedicated to building a sustainable platform with the social and intellectual density necessary for fruitful artistic exchange and professional collaboration. This being the goal, we accept that the network cannot be ‘all things to all people’, and that its success rests upon trust, mutual interest and respect. Strategies for growing the network will therefore be devised collectively, and gradually. Over the longer term, however, the network will be expanded, allowing artists to share their experience, resources and new ideas with emerging and future generations of the creative community.
A key long-term objective is technology transfer and skills transfer. We recognize that this sort of digital resource will be valuable in many other contexts, especially across Thailand and Southeast Asia where independent arts practice is not well supported by organizations. Once the Bangkok network is established and functioning sustainably we would like to share both the tools we have developed, and our experiences in doing so, with similar informal groups in the region. Our web platform will be transferable to other contexts, and will be propagated free of charge.