Pachara Piyasongsoot’s Politics of Stillness and the Art of Remembering

Pachara Piyasongsoot paints the weight of history as it ripples through daily life. His work is not concerned with grand events but with how their traces settle into the everyday life of how unrest, crisis, and political change quietly shape private memory and the still corners of ordinary rooms. Each image carries the imprint of national shifts that have long since left the headlines but remain etched in the rhythms of personal experience.

Pachara reveals how it seeps into the ordinary rather than depict history directly. From the 6 October 1976 massacre to the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the recurring coups, his paintings trace the subtle ways these forces shape identity, family, labor, and dreams. The landscapes feel familiar yet slightly unreal, suspended between the personal and the collective memory of Thai people.

In Chronoscapes, he continues this reflection. His work does not offer conclusions. It makes us feel the slow pressure of time, how memory fades and reforms, how meaning accumulates, and how history becomes part of our everyday lives.

What was the starting point of your career in the art world?

I started out as a graphic designer after graduating from Silpakorn University. I worked at a graphic house and agency. I took that path because I felt that becoming a full-time artist right after graduation wouldn’t provide financial stability. My interest in painting came from my uncle, but I didn’t pursue it seriously then because it felt like a risky path. While working as a graphic designer, I continued to paint and draw on the side. I slowly began attending exhibitions, and eventually, my work started to sell. That was the beginning of my journey as an artist, and it became something I could turn into a career.

Has painting always been your way of making art?

Yes. Even though I majored in printmaking, which requires access to a proper studio, painting always felt more accessible. I lived in a dorm back then, so I couldn’t create large-scale works there. But I resorted to a friend’s house to paint. For me, painting is the most familiar and manageable medium to work with because there’s accessible material, and it is more tactile.

What recurring threads or themes do you find yourself returning to in your work?

Landscape painting is a recurring theme in most of my work. Most of my landscapes are set during twilight when the sun is either setting or rising. I like the ambiguity of twilight because you can’t really tell whether it marks a beginning or an end. I usually work with a horizontal perspective, dividing the image across the canvas. I often use natural elements like light and the sun. Sometimes light itself acts as a storyteller in my work. I also try to incorporate nature in my art as much as I can.

 

Your work reflects both personal and collective memory. How do you give form to those memories, and how do you think they shift or evolve with time?

In school, we were taught a version of history that framed certain events as fixed or absolute. But I believe art is a powerful way to re-examine truth, not only through shared memory but through personal experience as well. It allows us to ask where we belong in society and what shapes our identity. Everyone sees and feels things differently. Two people can look at the same sunset and experience it in completely different ways.

This leads to a deeper question explored through the concept of the ontological turn: perhaps we are not simply interpreting the same world differently, but actually living in different realities. Art becomes a space where those realities can meet, where truth is not singular but unfolding and layered.

Martin Heidegger wrote that art does not explain truth but reveals it. While no method of understanding is perfect, I believe art can raise questions that the media or academic language often cannot. Memory itself is not fixed. It bends, reshapes, and offers us space to reflect on what is real, what is remembered, and what continues to echo in the present.

Martin Heidegger wrote that art does not explain truth but reveals it. While no method of understanding is perfect, I believe art can raise questions that the media or academic language often cannot. Memory itself is not fixed. It bends, reshapes, and offers us space to reflect on what is real, what is remembered, and what continues to echo in the present.

Could you walk us through the pieces in this exhibition and the stories they carry?

The first series shows a landscape resembling a garden with people walking through it. It was inspired by a sidewalk in Bangkok that reminded me of a morning fresh market. The work explores the idea of harvest as a metaphor for repeated political coups and the shifting power between government systems, as well as the labor of Thai farmers.

  Vanilla Sky, 2020

The second series shifts further from realism. It shows waves rising like armor, viewed from above with the sun in the center. I drew it using both isometric and one-point perspective. This piece made me realize that one painting alone cannot convey everything. When grouped into a series, the works build on each other and help me grow as an artist as I paint and experiment more.

 The Tree, 2023

 In the third series, I used myself as the subject. My earlier work focused on others, like villagers, the gardener, or an old communist and his comrade. But this time, I wanted to explore my own identity. I didn’t want to follow trends. I wanted to create something ordinary and honest. I focused on middle-class life, the economy, sustainability, and how architecture reflects our dreams. The Thai word “ว่าง”, meaning "vacant", appears in the piece. It’s the sign used in taxis to indicate availability and reminded me of the Tom Yum Goong economic crisis in 1997. At the time, my father lost his job in finance. At first, he started a small business renting out cars to taxi drivers, hoping it would help support our family. But when that didn’t work out, he eventually became a taxi driver himself. This piece draws from my childhood memories and the quiet moments we shared. I didn’t expect this work to become so political, but I’ve come to realize that art often finds its way back to politics.

How to Sleep, 2024

What do you want the viewers to feel or take away from your paintings?

I believe that good art does not give everyone the same answer. If it does, then something might be missing. My background in graphic design taught me how to communicate clearly, but art works differently. Paintings are not about giving answers. They are about raising philosophical questions and prompting reflection.

To me, good art starts a conversation. It encourages us to ask philosophical questions about subjective topics like life and beauty. Art pushes us to think about these topics more deeply and carefully. I also see art as a form of soft power. It may not have the immediate impact like the mainstream media, but it stays with you. It plants something inside you that makes you pause and reflect. It might not change everything at once, but it can spark something that stays with you, like a puzzle piece quietly finding where it belongs.

Pachara Piyasongsoot’s paintings do not seek to resolve the past. They reveal how it lingers in the quiet moments of daily life and shapes what we see or feel without us even noticing. Chronoscapes remind us that the past does not vanish. It lingers in how we see, what we remember, and the quiet ways we make sense of the world.  The exhibition is on view at West Eden Gallery until August 3, inviting you to look closer and feel the traces history leaves behind.

Written by Napat Tason
Images: West Eden