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.
For this double event in Florence, the project has therefore envisaged the creation of three itineraries: in relation to the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology, which this year celebrates its 250th anniversary, Jakkai was invited to engage with the figure of Galileo Chini (1873-1956), a renowned artist, decorator, and ceramist, drawn to the East, where he long resided and created numerous public works, including the fresco in the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall in Bangkok. Part of his Siamese collection was donated by the artist to this very museum. Therefore, Jakkai presents a new site-specific exhibition dedicated to the Tuscan artist's collection, along with a portion of the work Transient Shelter (2014), which focuses on the reflection on the relationships between life and death, the reversal of values, matter and spirit. For this occasion, the museum has partially rearranged this room with new works from the Chini Collection.
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.
For this double event in Florence, the project has therefore envisaged the creation of three itineraries: in relation to the Museum of Anthropology and Ethnology, which this year celebrates its 250th anniversary, Jakkai was invited to engage with the figure of Galileo Chini (1873-1956), a renowned artist, decorator, and ceramist, drawn to the East, where he long resided and created numerous public works, including the fresco in the Ananta Samakhom Throne Hall in Bangkok. Part of his Siamese collection was donated by the artist to this very museum. Therefore, Jakkai presents a new site-specific exhibition dedicated to the Tuscan artist's collection, along with a portion of the work Transient Shelter (2014), which focuses on the reflection on the relationships between life and death, the reversal of values, matter and spirit. For this occasion, the museum has partially rearranged this room with new works from the Chini Collection.
Hinweise für den Zutritt:
Direkter Einlass über den Kartenschalter und Einfügung in das erste verfügbare Zeitfenster für den Besuch.
Letzter Einlass eine halbe Stunde vor Schließung.
Photo gallery
