Sing Dance Cry Breathe: Korakrit Arunanondchai Externalises Human Emotion in Museum MACAN’S Latest Exhibition

One of Jakarta’s most significant conduits to the global art scene, Museum MACAN’s latest exhibition presents the works of Thai-born, New York and Bangkok-based artist, Korakrit Arunanondchai. The exhibition, titled ‘Sing Dance Cry Breathe | as their worlds collide on screen’ invites the audience into a vibrant theatre of ‘non-human actors’, where voice, song and breath together create an immersive viewing experience.

On view from 30 November 2024 to 6 April 2025, the exhibition features Arunanondchai’s works dating back to 2018, which collectively tell the story of the tension between our desires for renewal and the fear of letting go. This marks the artist’s first major solo exhibition in Indonesia.

The transformative potential of storytelling is at the crux of Arunanondchai’s works, often transcending and expanding upon the existing mediums in which we communicate. As such, for this milestone exhibition, Museum MACAN has provided the artist ample space to showcase his creative breadth, with expansive video installations, paintings, objects, and performative works all part of the experience.

“I think in today’s time, so much of how we feel is expressed through mediums outside of us, they hold our collective emotions, and we re-experience them through the screen. I wanted to create an exhibition that imagines itself as a theatre of non-human actors sharing space with us, carrying buried emotions that have been left with them. This exhibition is the stage, and the audience is invited to come as performers—to sing, dance, cry, breathe and feel the emotions we have once displaced onto the screen. So we can hear the cacophony of this non-human world sing these songs, carrying all these feelings back to us,” comments Korakrit Arunanondchai. 

Driven by fear of loss, the unknown, and uncertainty, the artist weaves animism and science fiction together to create works that prioritise human emotion and embrace complexity without definitive resolutions. This exhibition delves into the relationship between the ground and the sky, connected through various bodies in states of decay and becoming, all gazing downwards and praying for a new, flaming winged creature to emerge.

“This exhibition includes a diverse array of Arunanondchai’s works, presenting a prism of recurring themes including the simultaneity of decay and rebirth, spectrality, the collective desire towards forming a higher power and art as a process for spiritual upcycling. There will be a significant number of new paintings that have never been shown elsewhere,” adds Venus Lau, Director of Museum MACAN.

Open for public: 30 November 2024 – 6 April 2025
Opening hours: Tuesday – Sunday | 10am to 6pm

Tickets are available online:
museummacan.org

NOW! Jakarta

The article is produced by editorial team of NOW!Jakarta