Apichatpong Weerasethakul: A Serenidade da Loucura [Apichatpong Weerasethakul: The Serenity of Madness]
22 june — 16 september 2018
Curator: Gridthia Gaweewong

This retrospective exhibition of Apichatpong Weerasethakul, the internationally renowned artist and independent filmmaker from Chiang Mai (Thailand), features a trajectory of his career in over twenty works, from his first experimental films to his most recent work, including film, installation photography and documental material. In the last two decades, Weerasethakul’s reflexive, non-linear work has explored themes such as faith, memory and rebirth, often by resorting to the traditional narratives of his native Isaan. His stories reflect various literary and cinematographic genres, such as science-fiction, adventure and myth, as well as the American experimental film tradition. His narrative films, as well as his experimental projects and personal memories interlace with the ephemeral and the supernatural, evoking the fluidity and distortions of history. The exhibition A Serenidade da Loucura is structured according to an intuitive reaction of the artist to the exhibition space and is divided into different parts: one corresponding to his private world, peopled by close friends, family and long-term collaborators; the other including viewers through abstract dimensions of experience, such as light, memory, and the poetry of temporal, spatial and spiritual displacement. The study culminates with a selection of recent works that examine the social reality of his homeland. The presentation at Oliva Art Centre was coordinated by Apichatpong Weerasethakul and marked the European premiere of this project.

Apichatpong Weerasethakul: A Serenidade da Loucura is an itinerant exhibition curated by Gridthia Gaweewong and produced by ICI-Independent Curators International (ICI), New York, with the support of MAIIAM Chiang Mai Museum of Contemporary Art, the Curators Council of ICI and the International Forum of ICI. The presentation in Portugal was produced by Oliva Art Centre (São João da Madeira Municipal Council) in partnership with Centro de Arte de S. João da Madeira.