Sriwanichpoom Manit: Fear

Yavuz Gallery presents Fear, a solo exhibition by one of Southeast Asia’s leading photographic artists Manit Sriwanichpoom. Fear is the culmination of years of intensive exploration into Thailand’s current socio-political climate, beginning from the last general election in 2011 to the recent solar eclipse in March 2016. The exhibition explores the state that ordinary Thai citizens currently live in, as mere helpless passengers in the larger scheme of events. It embodies the growing sense of dread and outright panic for the future of Thailand that has been gathering within the artist, as a result of the escalating political and social crises.

The recent years have seen unprecedented political turmoil in Thailand. The country has been placed under martial law, moved between multiple leaderships and confronted with countless deadly riots and protests on the streets of Bangkok and beyond. Since 2011, the Thai people witnessed the transition of power from Abhisit Vejjajiva, a young Oxford-educated politician, to Yingluck Shinawatra, the sister of the controversial former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and finally to the current National Council for Peace and Order, a junta formed by former Commander in Chief Prayut Chan-o-Cha, who forcefully ousted Yingluck in May 2014 with a coup d’état.

These intense years in turn have inspired Sriwanichpoom to produce a large body of work comprising of ten series of photographs and two videos. Fear will open in four galleries in Singapore and Bangkok (Kathmandu Photo Gallery, H Gallery and Tang Contemporary) concurrently – with the most comprehensive selection of works exclusively in Singapore at Yavuz Gallery.

About the Artist
One of Thailand’s most internationally established contemporary artists, Manit Sriwanichpoom (b. 1961) has made a career of icon-study in the Thai context. A former photojournalist, he is best known for his on-going Pink Man series, which operates as an ironic and sometimes pathos-injected critique of consumer culture in Thailand and wider Asia. Sriwanichpoom has exhibited worldwide, including the 50th Venice Biennale in 2003, the 6th Asia Pacific Triennial in 2009 and at the Centre Pompidou in 2010. He is collected by the Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris), Fukuoka Asian Art Museum (Japan), Singapore Art Museum, National Gallery Singapore, Queensland Art Gallery (Australia), Vehbi Koc Foundation (Turkey) and numerous international private collections. In 2007, Sriwanichpoom was awarded Japan’s prestigious Higashikawa Photo Fiesta Prize, and in 2014 the Chevalier des Arts et Lettres by French Ministry of Culture & Communication. Fear is Sriwanichpoom’s first solo exhibition with Yavuz Gallery.