Journey of a yellow man No.4 - lee wen 李文
Journey of a yellow man No.4: libido
"Sense Yellow" group exhibition, installation and performance
Concrete House, Nontburi and Thamasat University, Bangkok Thailand
9-15 Oct. 1993
At the end of my last 'yellow man" performance I thought that I would not be using the yellow 'full body mask' anymore. The last action I did was shouting out:"You're already yellow, why do you still paint yourself yellow?!" and proceeded to wash myself in a basin of water. Standing up completely naked and cleaned off the yellow color, I went on to walk between two parallel chains and cried like a baby when I reached the end of this path. It was like a symbolic cleansing and re-birthing ritual.
In September my colleague, Koh Nguang How, from the Artists Village arranged an exhibition with Thai artist, Chumpon Apisuk at Concrete House, a gallery in Nontburi, on the outskirts of Bangkok. The exhibition was called "Sense Yellow" and involved 8 artists working on this theme. There were four Thai artists - Chumpon Apisuk, Vassan Sittiket, Paisarn Plienbangchang, Soontorn Meesri, with two German artists-Helmut Lemke and Veronika Radulovic and 2 Singaporean artists-Koh Nguang How and myself. The gestalt of working with these artists brought out many new dimensions to my work.
The color yellow, for example, had different meanings to these artists. In Asia, the color yellow is usually associated with many concrete things. Such as the saffron robes of monks, temples, yellow rivers, emperor and king, skin. But in western and modern society yellow can have many abstract meanings like danger, hazards, confidential secrets, pornography and vices.
Concrete House also doubles as the headquarters of EMPOWER, a women's support group founded by Chumpon's wife, Chantawipa Apisuk. With EMPOWER, Chantawipa has been helping women in the country's sex industry find alternative employment and also raising awareness and greater understanding of AIDS.
In my installation, I was using 2 basic materials-hair and jasmine flowers. The hair was collected from Bangkok's male barbershops. While collecting the hair I tried to distribute flyers and newsletters from EMPOWER and also getting to know Bangkok City and the people better.
Hair has different meanings to different people. For some it gives the allusion of death as when the body rots to dust, hair is left intact. Hair also can imply sensuousness, vanity, beauty, and karma. The most surprising thing was to find that hair and self is the same word in Thai language. Jasmine has some similar meanings in some ways. Women like to put jasmine in their hair; it gives a. sensuous aroma and sometimes made into perfumes. It is also used for worship in temples and funerals.
Through this work I was interested in Freudian psychology compared to Buddhist ideas. On the wall, in front of the pile of hair surrounded by jasmine flowers, I had 12 plastic packets of hair arranged in the digital positions of a clock, suggesting time. The 12 packets had a Thai word each labeling them. The words are basic terms in Buddhist and Freudian psychology -1) EGO, 2) NARCISSISM 3) KARMA, 4) LUST, 5) INSTINCT, 6) BELIEF, 7) BIRTH, 8) DEATH, 9) METTA, 10) BHAVA-TANHA, 11) VIBHAVA-TANHA, 12) NIRVANA. On the left corner of the wall was placed a bear mask on the floor and on the right corner was a monkey head mask. On the wall, within the circle of the packets, was written the English and rough Thai translation of an old Buddhist poem from the Sutta Nipata. It reads:
Love cometh from companionship;
In wake of Love upsurges ill ;
Seeing the bane that comes of love;
Fare lonely as rhinoceros.
In ruth for all his bosom-friends;
A man heart-chained neglects the goal,
Seeing this fear in fellowship,
Fare lonely as rhinoceros.
'Libido' is usually associated to sexual lust in popular psychology. However the word in Freudian usage could also imply the will to power and a hunger for life and human fulfillment. In Buddhist thinking, it is essential to discard the falsely conditioned self in order to achieve nirvana or the perfection of wisdom. As suggested in the quotation, isolation from society is highly recommended. I find this extremely severe and difficult as man is a social animal.
On the floor in front of the pile of hair and jasmine flowers is placed a few books on AIDS from Empowers library and a dead chicken plucked off its feathers. They are on some sheets of banana leaf like offerings of food we find in some Thai temples.
On the opening night of the exhibition, artists were to start performances at 10 minutes interval and continues till whoever feels its over. We began the evening with Veronika's performance. Four artists sat on chairs with 2 artists facing each other, their feet in 2 large aluminum basins of yellow water. The basins were placed over 2 charcoal fire stoves and the artists spoke to each other in 4 different languages German, Thai, Chinese and Malay. The performance ended when the water in the basin became too hot for our feet. I then went on to become the yellow man, starting at my installation where I laid down with my head on a pair of slippers on top of the books. The rubber sleepers acted like insulation or protection from the books of AIDS while I dreamt of peace and enlightenment. Getting up in the midst of the commotion when the other artists were doing their own performances. Soontorn was going wild in his "Yel-hi-low" corner Paisarn was reading his poetry, Koh improvised as a street beggar, Vassan was the blind monk leading the blind and Helmut played on his sound installation-"Tension between two Green Bamboos", and Chumpon was the "video man". I went on to respond to all the other installations by the other artists one by one. The night's performance ended with jamming together with Helmut on his installation.
On the final day of the exhibition, Helmut, Vassan and I decided to do a performance at Thamasat University where there was a 4 days carnival fair commemorating 20 years of democracy in Thailand. There were many stalls selling books, T-shirts and music tapes, mostly to raise funds for NGOs (non governmental organizations). There was also a stage with a live music concert on every day. Empower had a stall there and there was a space for performance beside the stall.
I walked around the university fair ground as the yellow man with 2 long red chains hanging around my body. After looking around the exhibits and stalls and concert, I went to join Helmut who was doing his performance at the space next to Empower's stall. Helmut was improvising with 20 odd aluminum plates, amplifying them and playing them with bows. I walked on the plates and improvised with the chains on them. Vassan was drawing with chalks human forms and Thai slogans on the concrete ground around us. Chumpon had intended to do his performance the next day but was inspired to join in. He reenacted a dream of how he found a man who was fragmented into various parts and he helped him to become whole again by putting his divided self together again. Vassan started chanting some poetry while I laid the chains into a parallel path and walked between them to and fro. I laid out the hair from my installation in a semi-circle in front of the plates and burned them. Helmut too started to burn his loudspeakers and Chumpon responded by throwing his 200 plastic Barbie female dolls onto the flaming hair in front.
Concrete House, Nontburi and Thamasat University, Bangkok Thailand
9-15 Oct. 1993
At the end of my last 'yellow man" performance I thought that I would not be using the yellow 'full body mask' anymore. The last action I did was shouting out:"You're already yellow, why do you still paint yourself yellow?!" and proceeded to wash myself in a basin of water. Standing up completely naked and cleaned off the yellow color, I went on to walk between two parallel chains and cried like a baby when I reached the end of this path. It was like a symbolic cleansing and re-birthing ritual.
In September my colleague, Koh Nguang How, from the Artists Village arranged an exhibition with Thai artist, Chumpon Apisuk at Concrete House, a gallery in Nontburi, on the outskirts of Bangkok. The exhibition was called "Sense Yellow" and involved 8 artists working on this theme. There were four Thai artists - Chumpon Apisuk, Vassan Sittiket, Paisarn Plienbangchang, Soontorn Meesri, with two German artists-Helmut Lemke and Veronika Radulovic and 2 Singaporean artists-Koh Nguang How and myself. The gestalt of working with these artists brought out many new dimensions to my work.
The color yellow, for example, had different meanings to these artists. In Asia, the color yellow is usually associated with many concrete things. Such as the saffron robes of monks, temples, yellow rivers, emperor and king, skin. But in western and modern society yellow can have many abstract meanings like danger, hazards, confidential secrets, pornography and vices.
Concrete House also doubles as the headquarters of EMPOWER, a women's support group founded by Chumpon's wife, Chantawipa Apisuk. With EMPOWER, Chantawipa has been helping women in the country's sex industry find alternative employment and also raising awareness and greater understanding of AIDS.
In my installation, I was using 2 basic materials-hair and jasmine flowers. The hair was collected from Bangkok's male barbershops. While collecting the hair I tried to distribute flyers and newsletters from EMPOWER and also getting to know Bangkok City and the people better.
Hair has different meanings to different people. For some it gives the allusion of death as when the body rots to dust, hair is left intact. Hair also can imply sensuousness, vanity, beauty, and karma. The most surprising thing was to find that hair and self is the same word in Thai language. Jasmine has some similar meanings in some ways. Women like to put jasmine in their hair; it gives a. sensuous aroma and sometimes made into perfumes. It is also used for worship in temples and funerals.
Through this work I was interested in Freudian psychology compared to Buddhist ideas. On the wall, in front of the pile of hair surrounded by jasmine flowers, I had 12 plastic packets of hair arranged in the digital positions of a clock, suggesting time. The 12 packets had a Thai word each labeling them. The words are basic terms in Buddhist and Freudian psychology -1) EGO, 2) NARCISSISM 3) KARMA, 4) LUST, 5) INSTINCT, 6) BELIEF, 7) BIRTH, 8) DEATH, 9) METTA, 10) BHAVA-TANHA, 11) VIBHAVA-TANHA, 12) NIRVANA. On the left corner of the wall was placed a bear mask on the floor and on the right corner was a monkey head mask. On the wall, within the circle of the packets, was written the English and rough Thai translation of an old Buddhist poem from the Sutta Nipata. It reads:
Love cometh from companionship;
In wake of Love upsurges ill ;
Seeing the bane that comes of love;
Fare lonely as rhinoceros.
In ruth for all his bosom-friends;
A man heart-chained neglects the goal,
Seeing this fear in fellowship,
Fare lonely as rhinoceros.
'Libido' is usually associated to sexual lust in popular psychology. However the word in Freudian usage could also imply the will to power and a hunger for life and human fulfillment. In Buddhist thinking, it is essential to discard the falsely conditioned self in order to achieve nirvana or the perfection of wisdom. As suggested in the quotation, isolation from society is highly recommended. I find this extremely severe and difficult as man is a social animal.
On the floor in front of the pile of hair and jasmine flowers is placed a few books on AIDS from Empowers library and a dead chicken plucked off its feathers. They are on some sheets of banana leaf like offerings of food we find in some Thai temples.
On the opening night of the exhibition, artists were to start performances at 10 minutes interval and continues till whoever feels its over. We began the evening with Veronika's performance. Four artists sat on chairs with 2 artists facing each other, their feet in 2 large aluminum basins of yellow water. The basins were placed over 2 charcoal fire stoves and the artists spoke to each other in 4 different languages German, Thai, Chinese and Malay. The performance ended when the water in the basin became too hot for our feet. I then went on to become the yellow man, starting at my installation where I laid down with my head on a pair of slippers on top of the books. The rubber sleepers acted like insulation or protection from the books of AIDS while I dreamt of peace and enlightenment. Getting up in the midst of the commotion when the other artists were doing their own performances. Soontorn was going wild in his "Yel-hi-low" corner Paisarn was reading his poetry, Koh improvised as a street beggar, Vassan was the blind monk leading the blind and Helmut played on his sound installation-"Tension between two Green Bamboos", and Chumpon was the "video man". I went on to respond to all the other installations by the other artists one by one. The night's performance ended with jamming together with Helmut on his installation.
On the final day of the exhibition, Helmut, Vassan and I decided to do a performance at Thamasat University where there was a 4 days carnival fair commemorating 20 years of democracy in Thailand. There were many stalls selling books, T-shirts and music tapes, mostly to raise funds for NGOs (non governmental organizations). There was also a stage with a live music concert on every day. Empower had a stall there and there was a space for performance beside the stall.
I walked around the university fair ground as the yellow man with 2 long red chains hanging around my body. After looking around the exhibits and stalls and concert, I went to join Helmut who was doing his performance at the space next to Empower's stall. Helmut was improvising with 20 odd aluminum plates, amplifying them and playing them with bows. I walked on the plates and improvised with the chains on them. Vassan was drawing with chalks human forms and Thai slogans on the concrete ground around us. Chumpon had intended to do his performance the next day but was inspired to join in. He reenacted a dream of how he found a man who was fragmented into various parts and he helped him to become whole again by putting his divided self together again. Vassan started chanting some poetry while I laid the chains into a parallel path and walked between them to and fro. I laid out the hair from my installation in a semi-circle in front of the plates and burned them. Helmut too started to burn his loudspeakers and Chumpon responded by throwing his 200 plastic Barbie female dolls onto the flaming hair in front.