art & design EmpirE StatE of mind
Images: Supplied
East and West collide in a thought-provoking pop art spectacle at London’s SCREAM gallery this month…
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elebrities and politicians sporting Mickey Mouse ears, Batman masks and Warhol fright wigs, and a ‘paper’ aeroplane made of aluminium: it is not difficult to see why Pakpoom Silaphan’s inimitable style of neo-pop art draws an enthusiastic crowd. The 40-year-old Thai artist’s first two solo exhibitions at London’s Scream gallery were sell outs and his third, Empire State, looks likely to do the same.
Silaphan’s fascination with globalisation, mass consumerism and the vast reach of cultural icons is prompted by personal experience. Having lived in two very different cultures - Thailand and London – he found a common language within popular culture. In Empire State he continues to explore this in new and interesting ways. For his Everybody project, scores of small portrait images of recognisable faces, from celebrities to politicians, fill a large grid. Each
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face is painted over with another iconic global reference – such as Warhol’s fright wig. Silaphan had reportedly seen Warhol’s image in Thailand but had not known who he was – mistaking him for a mad professor because of his hair. With the 1960s icon now one of his heros, this work aims to illustrate some of the challenges of globalisation: meaning getting lost in translation. Metal signs and crates collected by the Chelsea College of Art and Design graduate during his time in Thailand continue to be reworked, using a combination of collage and paint, to feature cultural icons, past and present. Rust and discolouring nod to time passed. And then there’s the not-so-small matter of Silaphan’s two-metre high aluminium ‘paper’ aeroplane, designed to look as though it has been made from the iconic 1963 ‘Whaam!’ by revered American artist Roy Lichenstein. “We have the canon of art history literally repositioned on obsolete advertising signs,” commented art historian and critic Jean Wainwright, “provoking the double recognition of brand on brand, the shared global language and the currency of art”. screamlondon.com