Join us for an informal lunch session and mini writing workshop with artist is residence, Apichaya Wanthiang. We’ll meet at Artica where Apichaya will share her observations and reflections on the past six weeks in Longyearbyen after which we will share home cooked Thai food.

Participants will then be invited to write a short paragraph as a response to Apichaya reading. The lunch session will conclude by sharing our written texts with each other.

When: Monday September 28th at 12:00 - 13:30

Where: Artica Svalbard, next to the fire station.

The event is free, to book a place please email: workshops@articasvalbard.no. 8 places available.

Yesterday the mountain was cooler than a blood moon,

 when I arrived the sun was a constant companion, resting in the corner of my right eye, throwing multi coloured light spots between me and the landscapes.

 Days passed, I noticed my own long shadows and thought if I were to make an art work or a  dance piece, the shadows and the weather could become close collaborators. It is already blurring, diffracting, flattening, and enhancing what is in front of me. 

 I learn about the presence of a fairly large Thai and even larger Filipino community here, yet the longer I stay the more I notice their absence in the social spaces that I frequent. In this small small place people from different groups seem to live somewhat sparallel lives, like the many species of lichen that I see, they too must compete, the lichen for light and territory, the people for labour and housing.

 Many of us are flocking here for adventures, study or research. The identity of this place is thoroughly tied to extractivism, first through coal and now through tourism and science. I notice the ground full with scars, a witness to the many data gathering endeavours. I can’t help but thinking, can I leave something more than what I’ve already taken? It’s seems improbable, yet an intriguing problem to try to solve. 

Apichaya Wanthiang