Pointilism's Point: Part II

Well that was just rubbish that last attempt so while I figure out the technical stuff here's an embedded player for you.

Pointilismspoint by charlesfrith

WTF

I was clicking around as usual on the net recently and noticed a new bar/restaurant/gallery in town called WTF (Wonderful Thai Friendship). No shit, but I felt an immediate sharp stab of cold creative jealousy that I hadn't realised what an insanely great name our internet acronym could be till someone else had snapped it up.

Anway WTF is the new hip hangout in town on Sukhumvit 51, Alley 7. I knew it was gathering steam when I was invited to join their Facebook group by P Tik who I interviewed earlier at WTF but ran over the 10 minutes that Youtube permits. I'll be splitting that later to post up here too.

As ever with these things, I also learned that I knew Som & Chris the owners of WTF and was really delighted to find that the art was good and provocative so I took advantage of the opportunity to interview Som about their new anti-establishment with a video installation in the background that was made by Jim Brewer on the topic of Yellow in Thailand. I was aware of his idea because I know Jim and he shared it with me some time back as out of nowhere (sort of), the wearing of yellow in support of his Majesty became ubiquitous every Monday. I explained it all back here in 2007 with what seems like a slightly prescient post though it isn't rocket science if you think about it.

Anyway this gusto for the colour diminished somewhat as over time the colour polarization of politics in Thailand became very sensitive with the now widely understood association of Red for the rural  impoverished classes.

The recording is a crap unfortunately because first I'm rubbish at thinking about sound, and as it's an art gallery on the 2nd and 3rd floor, it echoes too much to hear my questions so turn down the base and play with the treble if you can. I hope though that you can pickup Som sharing her new tapas, bar and art gallery concept and also talking a little bit about art in Bangkok and specifically Jim's work which is going on the background. Most interesting was the revelation that Yellow trainers were banned in Thailand as the feet are considered the most lowly part of the body to associate with anything let alone anything Royal.

She also talks about the stiff reaction that many of her Thai gallery visitors had about the video installation and their demands to know which farang (Westerner) artist was responsible for it. Anyway WTF is the kind of place that supports art as stimulus to discussion and is to be applauded loudly and embraced heartily for that alone, though the owners, clientèle I met, (Hi Andrew that was mad, call you soon) bar and tapas menu are enough reason to go and check them out. 

Unless you wish to avoid me in which case that's all very understandable. 

This Bangkok Post article covers the art much better than I have done here.

Censorship

Many of my readers in Thailand need to use a VPN to get around this image, you may also want to subscribe over here for the period while my blogging is censored as I'm piping my feeds to lots of unexpected places using a lot of digital backflips one of which I've filmed for you guys on the 10th floor of Communications Authority Tower, on 72 Charoenkrung Road, Bangrak. It was taken in the Andaman sea where we did the usual things like throw a ton of money into the Thai economy hiring a Yacht and then sailing around for a few days,

Ever been?http://charlesfrith.tumblr.com/