The Shattered Worlds: Micro Narratives from the Ho Chi Minh Trail to The Great Steppe
Curated by Gridthiya Gaweewong, Rinrada Na Chiangmai and Chanapol Janhom
The Jim Thompson Art Center and the Bangkok Art and Culture Center, Bangkok: 3 April–6 July 2025
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Archival Time on Our Retina
Curated by Lalita Singkhampuk and Angsada Sophonanon
Thai Film Archive, Bangkok: 11 February–1 June 2025
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Is the Cold War truly over if its remnants are still hotly felt? Amid recent attempts to reassess this tumultuous period, three Bangkokian institutions staged two group shows highlighting the Cold War’s complex legacy in Thailand and its Southeast Asian neighbours. While The Shattered Worlds: Micro Narratives from the Ho Chi Minh Trail to The Great Steppe at the Jim Thompson Art Center (JTAC) and the Bangkok Art and Culture Center (BACC) unravels microhistories linking Southeast Asia to the world through the work of thirteen research-based artists, Archival Time on Our Retina at the Thai Film Archive (TFA) examines Cold War sociocultural residues within Thai contemporary society. The exhibiting artists subvert dominant yet ambivalent wartime mechanisms—such as cultural icons, documentaries and historical paraphernalia—to excavate personal narratives once sidelined amid the Cold War tension.

Cultural icons, like American Abstract Expressionism or the Soviet Union’s Olympic athletes, function as Cold War devices to engender national identities and political allegiances. Thailand has also cultivated its own array of icons. One such contentious legacy is Muay Thai, traditionally providing a means of livelihood for young men of lower socio-economic status yet also potentially rendering them vulnerable to exploitation by their patrons. The kickboxing art is the subject of moving-image artist Chulayarnnon Siriphol’s video series Red Eagle Sangmorakot. While its three-channel iteration, ‘No More Hero in History’ (exhibited at BACC), juxtaposes the artist’s immersive Muay Thai training with historical footage of boxing matches and interviews with local Muay Thai experts, the video installation ‘Lessons from the Archive’ (at TFA) reveals the on-screen merge between Siriphol’s bodily movements during training with those of Red Eagle, an American-inspired superhero character made popular in 1960s Thai cinema. Siriphol questions the discourse of masculinity and nationalism entrenched in Muay Thai and the validity of heroic, albeit propagandic, archetypes that continue shaping Thailand’s cultural and ideological currents.

• Tags: Dương Mạnh Hùng, Issue 40, Thailand