Portraits of our Parents

All attention at the official opening of the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre on Wednesday was deservedly on Her Majesty the Queen as she marked her 77th birthday with a grand public appearance.

But waiting comfortably on the sidelines was the inaugural exhibition she came to see, "Virtues of the Kingdom", which occupies all nine floors of the new centre's display space.

Continuing until October 11, the dazzling show has three areas dedicated to His Majesty the King's untiring work for the country and the Queen's devotion to art and culture.

At the exhibition's heart is "Khon Prommas" on the eighth floor, comprising costumes and makeup produced by Her Majesty's Support Foundation and used to vivid effect in an acclaimed recent masked-dance performance

at the Thailand Cultural Centre.

More than 100 items, and many behind-the-scenes photos, are on view, and every weekend artisans will demonstrate how they create these small masterpieces. Meanwhile curator Apisak Sonjod is presenting "Unsung Melody  in a Lullaby" on the seventh floor, in which two poets and seven artists celebrate the contributions that mothers

- and women in general - offer society. Apisak has simply but effectively assembled symbols like breasts and other parts of the female form to build the exhibition, which must have been a difficult fit in the building's spiral

shape.

Visitors might be tempted as soon as they enter to rest for a moment in a breast-shaped beanbag, part

of Pinaree Sanpitak's installation "Noon-Nom". Further on are paintings by National Artist Angkarn

Kallayanapongsa and Chuang Moolpinit and Nonthivath Chandhanaphalin's minimal sculptures, all capturing the beauty of the fine lines of a woman's body. Surojana Sethabutra's terracotta "Earth, Water, Air, Fire" from 1996 takes

up four walls, and Pinaree's "Breast Stupa" from 2001 is a stroll through 37 unravelled pieces of silk in mammary form.

Nipan Oranniwesna's "Painting for my Mother" of 1996 salutes the essence of women, and in a nearby corner, his "Yellow Room" from 1995 has tonnes of rice resting on monks' plaited ropes.

The show concludes with an acknowledged masterpiece, 1992's "Silence from the Bosom and Sacred Power" by the late Montien Boonma (1953-2000). Set on a wooden dais are two bronze breasts, while a third rests upside down, fill¬

ing with water, and above them hangs a fourth. It "symbolises the gifts that nature unendingly imparts to humans, just as a mother unconditionally gives to her children", Montien once told German interviewer Alfred Palwin.

"This series represents love, warmth and good wishes. The gentle hum around the breast mimics the mother's heartbeat, like a lullaby when you rest against your mother's bosom."

Since the breast is the source of milk, Montien said, it represents the balance between life and death.

Images of His Majesty - smiling, serious, pensive, sympathetic - are seen in "The King's Portrait: The Art

of Iconography" on the ninth floor.

The 30-odd paintings, photos, sculptures and installations by living artists are mostly medium-sized, sometimes

seeming small in such a huge space. Many are familiar. Jakrapan Vilasineekul's life-size porcelain sculpture is a

highlight. It depicts His Majesty as a thoughtful young prince, but is lively with its daringly large use of the material. The future king's emotions are clear in his eyes and other finely detailed facial features.     

Wutikorn Kongka's "Impression Image No 2" is a Warhol-style rendering of a famous photo of Their Majesties meeting Elvis Presley.

Amnat Kongwaree's "Royal Rainmaking" is a clever use of Braille to create a low-relief painting.National Artist Preecha Thaothong's two-metre-high kinetic portrait "29,200 days - Symbolic of Efficiency" praises the King's "sufficiency lifestyle" theory by utilising traditional Thai motifs and handwriting.

The royal anthem plays during a film tracing the Kingdom's cinematic development and, finally, there is

a photograph by His Majesty, a lovely image that catches his shadow reflected in a pond at Klaikangwol

Palace in Hua Hin. There's more on the royal duties in the third-floor "Road to Friendship"

exhibit, featuring rare photographs of Their Majesties travels abroad since 1960.

On the fourth floor is "World Focus and Thai Focus", displaying magazine and newspaper spreads about

the royal couple, and on the fifth, you get a heart-warming array of babies' lullabies. The centre teems with other activities, not least of which is shopping among the 30 or so temporary stores on the first to fourth floors.

The Namthong Gallery, Thai Film Foundation, Film Archive, Bangkok Opera, Art 4D, with its super-cool product designs, H Schminche's painting gear and IceDEA's ice cream are among the joys

waiting to be discovered.