PAINTING IN THAILAND

Even if the tend to limit the history of classical painting in Thailand to the period of six centuries extending from the Sokhotai Kingdom to the western influenced Ratanakosin period, its study cannot be limited to the description of the most frequent subjects or to the analysis of a definite manner. Painting and graphic are two traditional techniques by Thai artist, but it should be clearly stated that they are not partitioned as in the western arts. In the West, due to the separation maintained between these two techniques, the art of lacquer has always been regarded as a decorative technique and could never attain the status of a major art form. In Thailand however, the role given to a painting in general blends in the same didactic intentions the different techniques of lacquer and mural painting. And since there is no real partition between techniques, since the artists work on the same subjects, there is no real urge to describe the techniques for themselves.

The various techniques may compel us to several adaptations, but the works show the same original vision, a common attitude towards nature, also recognizable in the literary works. It was often said and written that Thai painting was influenced by the theatre, but it is only partly true.

If the knowledge of the traditional theatrical gestures helps to understand the meaning of the painted scenes, we must not forget that both theater and painting used literary sources and tended to express in a pictural manner a poetical sense of reality.

In spite of its diversity, art in Thailand show and exceptional unity due less to the common subjects than to a common feeling and a common manner of translating the subjects.

The sharp observation and the peculiar sense of atmosphere mixed here allow us to visualize the meeting of every day people, gods and many other characters created by the surrealistically inclined imagination of the Thais. To se theses figures mostly influenced by Indian myths in a visual landscape adapted to the decorative purpose of the typical Thai art forms, the artists created their own action-centered laws of perspective. This manner was however forced to decline during the more and more western influenced XIXth century.

The western public often finds it difficult to relate to the scenes depicted in the Thai visual arts, mostly because they remain incomprehensive if one cannot read the text they illustrate. Thai painting is never gratuitous; every detail is carefully thought of and purposely meaningful.

Where a newcomer only sees stiff figures frozen in conventional postures, the lover of Thai art will automatically recognize the heroes of a particular Jakata or a passage of the Buddha's life. Seen from the outside these “obscure” scenes do not easily ravish us like they obviously do the Thai public accustomed by the oral tradition, dance and theatre, to the meaning of the different symbols. From the beginning, painting in Thailand had an educational purpose; a short text was always added to conjure every form of ambiguity that could distort the interpretation.

PARTICULARS TECHNICS

Manuscript

The samut Thai manuscripts were made out of khoi bark; this small tree is a kind of blueberry bush resembling the one used for the same purpose in Japan and China. We do not know exactly when the knoi was first used in Thailand, but it was noticed by an Italian writer traveling through the Kingdom of Aythya in 1504.

Many samut thai were unfortunately carelessly kept, but they still resisted astonishingly well to extremely humid conditions. The libraries were often built on water, and consequently, to preserve the manuscripts against countless insects, the monks cautiously kept some of them in boxes.

The colors and brushes

The fairly limited range of colors remained unchanged until the beginning of the XXth century. Ochre, chalk, coal, cinabar, malachite and orpiment were mixed with the resin of the mah khwit tree.

The slashed root of the lam chiek tree was used to produced the otlike effect for leaves, and the sharpened bark of the krah dang nga, mostly known for the fragrance extracted from its flowers and called ylang-ylang, was also used to make a different kind of brush.

Finer brushes were made out of animal hair or even the finest hair of the ear for delicate details.

The gold leaves were applied with the sap of mah dua, a fink of ficus.

To master the technical abilities for so many preparations, any thai artist needed a long apprenticeship comparable to the Italian or Flemish schools of our western classical era.

THAI RAMAYANA PAINTINGS FROM
THE RATTANAKOSIN PERIOD (early 20th Century)

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FRESCOS (MURALS) FROM AROUND 1950's

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