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SAKARIN KRUE-ON
“A Talebearer’s Tale: The Last Deer”
Tang Contemporary Art, Bangkok

Tang Contemporary Art Bangkok is proud to present “A Talebearer’s Tale: The Last Deer,” a solo exhibition for Sakarin Krue-On, from August 16 to September 23, 2017. This exhibition continues creative threads from the artist’s previous conceptual art, which draws inspiration from social history of Thailand and making it an accentuation of the present society.

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This solo exhibition, “A Talebearer’s Tale: The Last Deer,” serves as an extension of Monument of an Awakening Era, the work that Sakarin Krue-On showed at the 2012 Busan Biennale. The key work in this exhibition, A Talebearer’s Tale, also begins with the story of the Schomburgk’s deer. When we walk into the exhibition space, a classic desk sits in the middle, bearing the lifelike head of a Schomburgk’s deer. On a nearby wall hangs a Thai folk painting from the twentieth century; a video plays on the other side of the hall, showing the artist interviewing people on the street about the legend of the Schomburgk’s deer. The exhibition also contains a rich array of historical documents, and the overall layout of the show is reminiscent of a display in a natural history museum.
Through this exhibition, Sakarin Krue-On attempts to present his thoughts after encountering the world’s only Schomburgk’s deer specimen at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris. The Schomburgk’s deer, a species unique to Thailand, is now extinct. In the forests of Kanchanaburi Province in 1932, the last Schomburgk’s deer fell to a hunter’s gun. In Samut Sakhon in 1938, a drunkard beat the last recorded Schomburgk’s deer to death at a local temple. When the artist discovered this unique Schomburgk’s deer specimen in Paris, he finally realized that the legendary, beautiful animal that he had heard about since childhood actually once existed.
“A Talebearer’s Tale: The Last Deer” conveys the tragedy of the extinction of this beautiful, legendary species, but the show also explores the greed in human nature, and the irreversible impact people have had on the world and later generations due to a lack of moral restraint and reverence. The artist hopes that viewers will, through the story and extinction of the Schomburgk’s deer, consider Thailand’s social transformation, and the country’s distinctive cultural identity, values, and traditions as it attempts to find balance between the past and the future amidst globalization and economic and social development.

Sakarin Krue-on

Born in 1965, Mae Hong Sorn, Thailand, Sakarin Krue-On is an internationally renowned contemporary artist. His works are often site-specific installations with traditional Thai cultural influences. The art of Sakarin Krue-On consists of various approaches, ranging from meticulously planned terraces based on traditional farming techniques to digital media installations.
As the key figure in establishing the media department at Silpakorn University, the premier training ground for artists and art historians in Thailand, Sakarin Krue-On also represented the first-ever Thai Pavilion at the 50th Venice Biennale (2003), and he was the first Thai artist to participate in Documenta (2007). Terraced Rice Field and Nang Fa (Angel), both site-specific installations exhibited at the 2007 Kassel exhibition, have exemplified his artistic endeavor to create provocative art as well as traditional Thai paintings. As a prolific artist, Sakarin Krue-On was recently honored with Prudential Eye Award 2016 / Lifetime Achievement Award from the Asian Contemporary Art in Singapore.
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    WeChat Image_20170814125015