Sunday, January 9, 2011

SKALL - SILAGI



SATURDAY 15 JANUARY 2011 7 PM TOOT YUNG GALLERY

Opening exhibition of Hungarian artist SI-LA-GI and performance by French artist SKALL

On the theme of society secrets, Hungarian artist SILAGI produced an in situ work during two weeks in the Toot Yung Gallery.

On the 15th January the result of the work will be visible during the opening reception starting 7PM. On the same evening you will see a playful and colorful performance by French artist SKALL.

SI-LA-GI

SI-LA-GI was born in Tokaj, Hungary in 1949 and emigrated via Italy to Sweden in 1966.
There he studied painting at the Academy of Fine Art and later continued his studies at the University of Stockholm (Science of visual arts). In the meantime he also worked with experimental film and photography in the 1960s and from 1973 also with videos. He was the pioneer in the mid-1970s who began making installations using video. At the end of the 1970s he was co-founder of the Video Nu Studio in Stockholm which gave artists the opportunity to create experimental arts. In his art he uses diverse media, including photography, video, sculpture and installation. His works are concept and philosophy-based investigations of impermanence, life and death, and individual opportunities. Between 1980-1986 he taught art video and painting in Stockholm. He has travelled widely throughout the United States of America, Africa and Asia, where he developed his interest in Buddhism. His martial art studies and long Buddhist retreats have had a great influence on his concept-based art.

more about the artist:
http://www.si-la-gi.com/home/

SKALL

Since the 80ies French artist Skall has elaborated a unique work between, sculpture, installation and performance.
This black sheep of the French contemporary art scene evolves in a world of Baroque hybrid figures and objects. The works remind of certain religious ornaments, in which relics, sculptures and amulets are presented on stands, in glass boxes, or cushions with an infinate string of decorative elements meant to highlight the presented object and lift it to a sacred stage.
As his sculptures and installations, Skall's performances lift him to a different stand. By accumulating chosen objects, for their beauty or symbolism his body slowly evolves in a non human creature. Every performance is a splendorous metamorphosis; An explosion of colors and forms giving birth to an ephemeral God, Faune or mystical animal.

more about the artist:
http://www.galerie-mam.com/index/index.php?id=21&subid=2&nr=89
http://www.artween.com/Galleries/Mario-Mauroner-Contemporary-Art-Vienna/SKALL-A-Light-Beyond-Darkness
http://vimeo.com/10106874

Sunday, January 2, 2011

No Superego by Tada Hengsapkul



TOOT YUNG GALLERY 19 JAN - 4 MAR 2011
OPENING RECEPTION 19 JAN 7 PM ONWARDS


TOOT YUNG GALLERY
19 PRACHATHIPATAI RD.
10200 Phra Nakon
Bangkok Thailand
Tel: 66(0)849145499
mail: tibayrenc@yahoo.fr



Tada Hengsapkul, born in 1987 in Nakhon Ratchasima, has had a camera in his hands since the age of fifteen. This very passionate young Thai photographer uses film cameras and video to capture hidden identities of his homeland, Thailand. He has recently received his Bachelor’s Degree of Art of Photography from Pohchang Academy of Arts.



“No Superego” is a selection of recent and older photos and videos taken over the past 5 years. Topics approached are gender, nature, and sexuality;

Tada Hengsapkul’s photographs often awake a sense of nostalgia. Using mostly film cameras he favors the candid and unplanned over the technically polished and precise shots. The raw, snapshot-like quality of his photographs, evoke films in their look and sense of storytelling.



In his photos and videos Hengsapkul offers an intimate glance at “his” Thailand; His close friends, schoolmates, lover, family, neighbors, and also the nature, the Thai countryside where he was born. The freshness and realism of his photos shift conventional standards of image making in Thailand as well as old power structures and pre-defined gender roles. The crudeness of the nudes, the sexually explicit pose of his models, and the irony of certain scenes emphasize the gap between his works and photos which are praised by the local critique and censorship board. Hengsapkul is attracted by the reality surrounding him. As a response to the watered down photos found in the local magazines and television shows, Hengsapkul focuses on shooting reality with no artifice.

His works could be closely inspired by contemporary photographers such as Wolfgang Tillmans, Richard Billingham, Philip-Lorca diCorcia or Nan Goldin. The overall emotion landscapes sometimes resemble works by Thai filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul.



This exhibition is Hengsapkul’s first solo show in Bangkok; it presents a broad selection of quality works. From landscapes to nude, portraits and abstract color fields Hengspkul’s photos all have a strong emotional and elegiac core which will certainly not leave the viewer indifferent.