Sina Wittayawiroj’s exhibition Can’t We Recant? An Exhibition of Life, Art, Politics, and Death (เราจะถอนคำพูดไม่ได้เลยหรือ? นิทรรศการ ชีวิต ศิลปะ การเมือง และความตาย) opened at Kinjai Contemporary in Bangkok on 13th December, and runs until 25th January. The exhibition explores Sina’s personal and artistic background, and his connection to the major political events of his lifetime. Sina’s essay film Your Ash and My Bone (ธุลีดาว) is also screening throughout the exhibition.
One section, which deals with the 2010 red-shirt crackdown, is titled The Awakening, situating Sina within the “Post-Ratchaprasong art” movement, a label coined by the journal Read (อ่าน; vol. 3, no. 2) describing artists whose work took on a political dimension in response to the crackdown. Sina is one of a generation of artists, writers, and filmmakers who experienced a political awakening in 2010, including Prakit Kobkijwattana, Veeraporn Nitiprapha, Uthis Haemamool, and Chulayarnnon Siriphol. Political awakening is known in Thai as ta sawang, and Chulayarnnon — along with five other directors — discussed his ta sawang experience in an interview for Thai Cinema Uncensored.
The Awakening features two installations. One is a life-sized recreation of a famous photograph from 15th May 2010, showing a soldier next to a sign warning that live ammunition was used against the red-shirts. (Red splotches have been added to the soldier’s uniform, as a reminder that the sign was accurate.) The other is a pile of red-shirt memorabilia (such as handclappers and clothing), under a neon pyramid.
