Pratchaya Phinthong’s world is a play of equivalences and flux, an organised ensemble of tensions between two positions; his art becomes a prolongation of this complex system, as the gallery turns itself into an active partner in a business whose stakes go beyond the habitual boundaries of art. Continuous with a history of conceptual art, his work is built into the interstice between a reality and its representation, between an experience and its form. Pratchaya Phinthong translates elements of the real world (a rumour, a scientific discovery, a trip into a form or a gesture).
As a project is brought to fruition, the shift from one field into another can, at times, also modify reality. Through a sort of mirror effect, the artist also questions the status of the author and sometimes frees himself from the fetish of the work of art by delegating everything, including the form the work is to take. As an entrepreneurial artist in the face of the plague of sleeping sickness in Africa, as an agricultural worker in Lapland, or as a moon hunter, before anything else, Pratchaya Phinthong tells stories. His micro-situations often take the form of excursions, linking one point to another or traversing the two sides of the same thing. His projects are often the pretext for creating a new human exchange and for growing a dense, social network. The journey is a structural element of his works because it allows his limits to be pushed to his own identity as well as the collective perception.
Pratchaya Phinthong works in a dynamic area in between different realities underlining the space and distance that seperates them: two geographical points, two societies, two economical systems. His sets, fictions, or process develop different layers of narratives and connect people. Playing with duality amplifies the vision that everything is interconnected, creating a poetical dialogue from an almost invisible artistic gesture.
Profile picture and bio in courtesy of the artist and gbagency.
Writings:
PRATCHAYA PHINTHONG: Mines the alchemy of found objects in “No Patents on Ideas”, Artforum, February 20, 2025 4:22 pm.