For over a decade, New York-based interdisciplinary artist Bruce Gundersen has been fascinated by Southeast Asian mythical folk tales. Stories like Pla Boo Thong (The Golden Goby Fish) and Champa Thong have long been passed down from generation to generation through text, song, dance, visual arts, and even in TV series and movies.
Gundersen found his own approach to depict the surreal tales he's come to love. Travelling to Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar and Thailand for extensive periods of time, he set out to photograph landscapes, paintings, textures and portraits and merge them into surreal photo montages which walk the line between painting and photography.
Many Rivers by Bruce Gundersen
All inspired by the lures of the region, his latest exhibition "Many Rivers" at Silom's Kathmandu Photo Gallery is full of fantastical images that call for a double-take. There's a cobra with a woman's wistful face sitting on a rock, a "tree of life" with small animals floating around a silhouette of a tree, a burning ocean underneath a supermoon, and a white buffalo floating on a black and gold patterned background. To top it off, they're all printed on fabric -- giving life and animation to the figures and tales with each shift of air.
"I am fascinated by the interplay between the supernatural and corporeal worlds filled with characters that are vividly depicted through the arts," he states. "My work reflects a contemporary approach to an ancient codified language of gesture and storytelling. Historically, Buddhist monks would travel with silk paintings narrating the life of the Buddha."
Gundersen did extensive research on whichever myth, legend or folk tale he took an interest in and drafted a storyboard of how the scenes would be created. Travelling to each country, he worked with local artists and dancers to collect the building blocks of his works. Part anthropology, part art, part spiritual journey, Gundersen went back to New York and manipulated the elements on Photoshop, creating mysterious montages.
"The overall effect is somewhere in between photography and painting -- paying homage to the indigenous folk vernacular with a feel of antiquity. However, the techniques, digital photography, the application of sampling and printing are all very contemporary."
"Many Rivers" by Bruce Gundersen Now until Oct 27 Kathmandu Photo Gallery Tues-Sat, 11am-6pm
