Jakkai Siributr. (Im)Material Culture
(Im)Material Culture is the first solo exhibition in Italy by renowned Thai artist Jakkai Siributr (October 23, 2025 - January 18, 2026), held at MAD and at the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology of the University of Florence.
The exhibition is intended as a retrospective of the artist's thirty-year oeuvre, but also as a site-specific exhibition that intertwines East and West, memory and contemporaneity.
Refined fabrics and precious embroideries translated into monumental installations, alongside collective embroideries and artifacts, developed in workshops and dialogues with women from Tuscan communities: a unique exhibition that explores female memory and participatory practices, intertwining Thai traditions with those of the Tuscan women.
Jakkai Siributr (Bangkok, 1969) works with fabric through an iconic use of embroidery, sewing and quilting, and he is internationally considered one of the most important representatives of textile art, an art form traditionally associated with the female gender.
The distinctive feature of Jakkai's practice lies in the combination of individual and relational work. Interested in human relationships, the exchange of experiences and stories, sometimes traumatic, the artist often works collectively, engaging with primarily female and vulnerable communities, with whom he conducts sewing sessions. A prime example of this is the environmental installation There's no Place (2019-ongoing), composed of approximately one hundred pieces of fabric embroidered together with young Shan people exiled from Myanmar, chosen for exhibition at MAD.
The artist views sewing as meditative and therapeutic, but also as a participatory tool for giving voice to minor, untold, mnemonic, or inherited narratives. The final results of the workshops combine tradition and a contemporary approach, through the layering and experimentation of techniques and fabric types, sometimes assembled with old clothing, fabrics, and personal objects belonging to the participants.
At MAD Murate Art District, it will be possible to view for the first time in Italy both a selection of works - including tapestries, clothing, and environmental installations -, produced from 2014 to the present, as well as the double collective project the artist was invited to create with the women's communities with migratory backgrounds of Nosotras and Casa delle Donne, as well as with the large female community involved in the project launched by the Municipality of Barberino Tavarnelle to transfer the ancient knowledge of "Punto Tavarnelle," in a spirit of intergenerational transmission of knowledge and high-quality craftsmanship.
For this occasion, Jakkai has therefore explored the journeys of these two distinct women's communities, the legacy of Galileo Chini, and the sensibilities of students and the public, working on the creativity of each individual, sharing memories, experiences, dreams, and tensions, both material and immaterial.
The exhibition is intended as a retrospective of the artist's thirty-year oeuvre, but also as a site-specific exhibition that intertwines East and West, memory and contemporaneity.
Refined fabrics and precious embroideries translated into monumental installations, alongside collective embroideries and artifacts, developed in workshops and dialogues with women from Tuscan communities: a unique exhibition that explores female memory and participatory practices, intertwining Thai traditions with those of the Tuscan women.
Jakkai Siributr (Bangkok, 1969) works with fabric through an iconic use of embroidery, sewing and quilting, and he is internationally considered one of the most important representatives of textile art, an art form traditionally associated with the female gender.
The distinctive feature of Jakkai's practice lies in the combination of individual and relational work. Interested in human relationships, the exchange of experiences and stories, sometimes traumatic, the artist often works collectively, engaging with primarily female and vulnerable communities, with whom he conducts sewing sessions. A prime example of this is the environmental installation There's no Place (2019-ongoing), composed of approximately one hundred pieces of fabric embroidered together with young Shan people exiled from Myanmar, chosen for exhibition at MAD.
The artist views sewing as meditative and therapeutic, but also as a participatory tool for giving voice to minor, untold, mnemonic, or inherited narratives. The final results of the workshops combine tradition and a contemporary approach, through the layering and experimentation of techniques and fabric types, sometimes assembled with old clothing, fabrics, and personal objects belonging to the participants.
At MAD Murate Art District, it will be possible to view for the first time in Italy both a selection of works - including tapestries, clothing, and environmental installations -, produced from 2014 to the present, as well as the double collective project the artist was invited to create with the women's communities with migratory backgrounds of Nosotras and Casa delle Donne, as well as with the large female community involved in the project launched by the Municipality of Barberino Tavarnelle to transfer the ancient knowledge of "Punto Tavarnelle," in a spirit of intergenerational transmission of knowledge and high-quality craftsmanship.
For this occasion, Jakkai has therefore explored the journeys of these two distinct women's communities, the legacy of Galileo Chini, and the sensibilities of students and the public, working on the creativity of each individual, sharing memories, experiences, dreams, and tensions, both material and immaterial.
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