Bangkok Wires by Photographer Thomas Kalak

“In everyday Bangkok, western ideas of order and system have no place at all.”

I disagree.

As one who knows (yes, I’ve actually been to Thailand many times), most Thais (in BKK at least) want “western ideas of order and system”. They view western ideas as a better way of life, and they view the neat-n-tidy order of many American cities as something they wish for in their cities there in Thailand. However, they also have a long history of Thai traditions as well. And one of the Thai traditions is their laid-back approach to progress and modernization. The line from Anna and the King rings very true: “In Siam you will learn everything has its own time.”

Unfortunately Thailand’s progress into the modern age is greatly hindered by two major issues: Money and corruption. Thailand is not exactly a nation rich in monetary wealth (to put it politely). Corruption (both from outside and from within) have also impacted the economy there.

But as far as the mass tangles of overhead wires nearly everywhere in BKK (and Thailand in general) goes, yes, it’s pretty shocking by “Western” standards. I remember being somewhat surprised by how easy it would be to reach out and literally grab one of those high-voltage lines as I was climbing some stairs going up to the BTS. When I asked my Thai friends about it, they just looked at me and said, “Nobody does that. Everyone knows you’ll get shocked!” That made me realize just how the safety-nazis here in America have greatly stupefied the citizens here: Take away all of the dangers and watch how Americans are stupid enough to reach out and grab a high-voltage line in BKK.

I do agree with Thomas about one thing: Those wires may look like a rats nest, but they work, which is all that really counts there.

And we were wondering where McGiver had disappeared!

This image reminds me of a photo I took when I lived in Beijing (http://flickr.com/photos/solupine/2793775963). Another time when I was walking with a friend we saw workers rewiring a pole and there were live wires all over the sidewalk. At one point a wire came falling down very close to where we were walking. It was an exciting experience for sure.

Hallo SYMPA,
i understand your attitude but in this case i think it´s a little more comprehensive and not a sad case.also i have no depressions. if you are interested in other stuff about bangkok, search for my new book “thailand – same same but different. in the meanwhile i send you this context about my idea of the “crazy wiring”.

thx
thomas kalak

Thomas takes a photographic view of supposedly meaningless details in the urban context that only become valuable as the subject of an image by the fact that they are constantly in the urban panorama. His latest series kabel in bangkok is dedicated to the electricity and telecommunications cables omnipresent in Bangkok that seems to carry on their own lives above the heads of passers-by – unplanned, uncontrolled and just plain chaotic.

As in his earlier work, Kalak tackles an aspect of everyday culture here that tells us a lot about life in the city. Kalak’s documentary view finds expression in an unfalsified snapshot aesthetics that puts what one sees in the centre of attention and gives his pictures a stunning effect. In the age of digitalisation with its virtually unlimited possibilities for manipulating images, Kalak seems to consciously return to a “realistic tendency” (Siegfried Kracauer) with his unpretentious visual language that identifies the photograph in its aesthetic language as a faithful reproduction of reality. He shows everyday phenomena without artistic hyperbole and the simplest of tools whose narrative potential only develops fully when taken together and therefore when presented as photographic series.

The cables spread like a sore into the furthermost corners of Bangkok and grow into even the smallest kitchen to let them partake of the blessing of state-of-the-art power supply and telecommunications. And, while in some pictures the cable draw lonely circles on the sky, elsewhere they brutally break out into the sphere of humanity as agglomerations in the ground, thus presenting a real threat. It is especially these images that show a shocking view of a foreign world to the eye of the Western observer and where Kalak bears witness to his bewilderment in the face of the overwhelming presence of these masses of cable. Filthy, massive, ugly and unrelenting – this is how these cables penetrate into the visual field of passers-by everywhere in the city, whoosh over poster walls, occupy houses and lock the sky shut.

You can hardly recall their functions and you find it difficult to believe that this chaos might be disentangled or even given a structure. Kalak’s photographs offer a terrifying, but also fascinating image of a system that seems to have emerged independent without any consideration of the living space of people while obliviously guiding the flows of energy that keep the city alive. This supposed loss of control of uncontrollable technology gives us an idea of the threatening force that people may have felt when they saw the first locomotives, steam machines or conveyor belts.

But some of these cable structures have a bundled material weight combined with the apparent weightlessness of the insulated lines. That gives them an abstract expressive value with their various densities and dynamic loosening that reminds one of installations in the artistic context. This is the reason why Kalak’s documentary images also constitute symbols of the burgeoning global networking in the age of globalisation and the unbridled growth of exploding mega-cities. The structures shown here are iconic for the functioning of a constantly growing but planless system that promises civilisational progress while creeping along on the verge of collapse. As much as we are fascinated with the capability of the inhabitants of Bangkok to keep their city alive with modesty, improvisation and a belief in the future in spite of all tension and contradictions, Thomas Kalak’s still chimes with the threats and hazards that could emerge from an unbridled belief in progress.