Tricks of the trade
Delayed for a year, the fourth edition of “Unfolding Kafka Festival” is as cutting-edge as ever and provide the audience with more hands-on learning experience than before
It’s the last two months of the year and, like it was pre-pandemic, Bangkok is full of arts festivals. Bangkok Art Biennale (BAB) is on until February and kicking off this weekend is Bangkok Theatre Festival (BTF).
Photo Credit: “PLI” by Vojtech Brtnicky; “Haptic Installation” by S20; James Bachelor by Andrew Sikorski
Already up and running with sheer vigor is the bilingual multidisciplinary Unfolding Kafka Festival which last weekend opened with a unique collaboration between French conductor Michaël Cousteau, Thai choreographer Jitti Chompee and his company 18 Monkeys Dance Theatre as well as PGVIM (Princess Galyani Vadhana Institute of Music) Baroque Ensemble, thanks the French Embassy’s support which also made possible two solo performances “Comme un Symbole” and “Quelques-uns le demeurent” by French dancer and choreographer Alexandre Fandard this Wednesday (November 9) and Thursday (November 10) at Lido Connect.
“This fourth edition was supposed to take place last year but it has been delayed because of the pandemic,” says Jitti, the founder and artistic director of the festival.
“I already planned it way back right after the 2019 edition and I spent the gap year working on a project on Khon with Department of Fine Arts, Ministry of Culture. At the moment I also have some ideas which works will be in the 2024 edition—which will be the last one before I start a dance conservatory—and then I plan to watch these works to see how complicated it is in terms of logistics. That’s how I’ve been curating the festival,” explains the artistic director who says that his curation is self-taught.
“For this edition, I focus on the choreography of the works and up and coming artists who’re mainly touring in Europe [instead of superstars]. I also make sure that the content of their works is somehow related to the festival’s keyword of ‘metamorphosis’.”
This Wednesday (November 9), the audience at Lido Connect was thrilled by Czech artist Viktor Cernicky’s “PLI” in which he arranges 22 identical conference chairs into various images beyond our imagination.
Tomorrow (November 12), the audience will have a chance to see him outdoors at the tennis court of Peninsula Hotel, listen to his talk and play with his chairs.
Jitti recalls, “Thanks to the European network Aerowaves I got to know about Cernicky for the first time in, I think, 2017. During the pandemic, a festival in Cambodia presented ‘PLI’ online. I watched it and was thrilled. Then I emailed him and traveled to watch it live in Barcelona where I also met his producer to discuss the logistics of how to bring it to Thailand.
"A challenge was how to transport these 22 conference chairs and in the end we had them made in China and shipped here, saving much cost, as well as to Hong Kong where the work will soon be staged [at Tai Kwun Center for Arts over the New Year holidays].
"Later I watched this work again in Prague to make sure we can handle all the technical requirements and to refer him to Bangkok International Children’s Theatre Festival (Bict Fest) as it was staged at The Place in London with workshops for young children.”
After the two performances, the chairs will be installed along with a brief introduction video by Cernicky at the Jim Thompson Art Center from November 19 to 27 when the visitors are welcomed to play and experiment with them, for self-education.
In the same venue from November 22 to 27 are the 2022 video installation work “Mold 1” and the 2010 one “Haptic Installation” by Japanese dancer and computer graphic wiz Hiroki Umeda, who will also give a lecture on his transdisciplinary works on November 23 thanks to the support by Japan Foundation, Bangkok.
Jitti adds, “The visitors are also welcomed to take a video of their creations inspired by these installations at the Jim Thompson Art Center, posting it with the hashtag ‘#UnfoldingKafkaFestival’ and stand a chance to win Bt 10,000 prize money. I myself tried stacking these chairs but I failed every time.”
At the same venue, Australian choreographer James Bachelor, who has presented a few works here before the pandemic, will also present a new work “Shortcut to Familiar Places” and give a dance workshop.
Commemorating the 70th anniversary of the diplomatic relations between Australia and Thailand, Bachelor will work with his Thai counterpart Pakhamon Hemachandra in a homage to his teacher Ruth Osborne who was trained in the methods of modern dance pioneer Gertrud Bodenwieser.
Many people here are still unsure about attending live performances, as we become more familiar with their online counterparts and paranoid about the new and less severe variants of COVID-19. This festival, though, is a proof that, with a curatorial scheme that focuses on the audience’s understanding and appreciation of arts, it’s really worth our attendance.
“Unfolding Kafka Festival 2022” continues until November 27. For details on other works, visit www.UnfoldingKafkaFestival.com. For tickets, ticketmelon.com or email [email protected]
