The Liquid Mandala: Art Brut and Mystical Landscapes in the Marginal Spaces of Bangkok

Abstract

In 2014, graffiti with pictograms and technical-looking diagrams began appearing on the streets of Bangkok, drawing attention by the meticulousness with which they were executed in spite of their apparent lack of meaning. The author turned out to be a homeless person named Sametr Pattanapornchai who suffered from some obsessive-compulsive disorder and claimed that his hieroglyphs were intended to shed light on the calamities that had plagued his and his family’s lives. Spreading through the streets and urban elements of the Thai capital, his drawings became popular to the point of being featured, alongside the most renowned international artists, at the Bangkok Art Biennale in 2020. His psychological condition and innate talent have allowed him to find a place for the expression of his individuality amidst the real estate speculation and the junkspaces generated by infrastructures works and globalisation. Sametr’s work has proven to be a fine tuned characterisation of the urban flows and marginalised interstices of contemporaneity, where syncretic practices are superimposed on the modern life on a daily basis.