This Friday, January 5, 6:30pm - 9pm, Reisig and Taylor Contemporary is holding a Closing Reception and Birthday Celebration for Suwichada Busamrong-Press. Suwichada’s debut solo exhibition, “Chapter 2: A Long Way Home,” is on view (by appointment only) at the gallery through the Closing Reception on January 5. The Limited Edition Exhibition Catalogue is available at the physical gallery as well as online on the gallery’s website. …. Adapting traditional techniques of labor, craft, writing, and medicine to contemporary practices of painting, sculpture, and performance, Suwichada’s work challenges (Western) art historical hierarchies of cultural production. Her mixed-technique, mixed-tradition work reshapes the relations between economies of survival and celebration, combining Isaan Thai ancestral knowledges with her education in art and architecture at multiple institutions in the United States. Sewing canvases like she would when making her own clothes; sculpting pots that are (practically) used to produce food; refining turmeric extracts for pigments in the same way her grandfather made medicines; writing across the surfaces in all the languages she inhabits; and working on the ground, “washing” the textile canvases as if she were cleaning or dying a garment. All of these processes are seamlessly incorporated into her fine art practice. The work (of art) produces the artwork. ____ My work evokes a passage through a long journey to find myself. Each piece is born from a reverence for my ancestors and the simple beautiful life with nature they cultivated. Through a combination of abstract forms, I explore how traditional cultures and values connect to new ideas of modern living. I am influenced by my Northeast Thai roots and the vibrant colors of my dialect culture, emphasizing spontaneity while also connecting to the emotive quality of each form. I hope that these stories can be experienced in a way that reminds us of the subtleties and nuances of our history. | Suwichada Busamrong-Press (b. 1975 in Khonkean, Thailand) is a Thai-American artist based in Los Angeles, California. She is an interdisciplinary artist who begins by recalling her memories in writings and transfers them into paintings, sculpture, and performance. Suwichada earned her B.F.A. in interior design and fiber from the College for Creative Studies and her M.Arch. in architecture from Cranbrook Academy of Art (both in Detroit). She received her M.F.A. from Otis College of Art and Design in 2023. Her work has been presented in various group shows around the country, including: Detroit, New York, Dallas, and Los Angeles. | Image: Installation ViewNight. Positioned at gallery rear, oriented toward Southwest corner.