The party, if you could even call it that, was a relaxingly casual affaira table of food next to a pot of boiling water to make your own food, a few bottles of whiskey, clusters of people grouped around the stone walls that surrounded the flagstone drivewaywith a man playing the guitar as if no one was listening. I was introduced to professors and artistsspoke about my work and Thailand, their work and Americaand then to the father of Thai modern dramait was that kind of crowd. Inside a building the walls were covered20×24 framed pieces stacked three or four high on the walls all the way around the roomwith quick gestural paintings of landscapes by Lon Teep, one of Thailands most famous artists.
Pee Ann brought me around the back, to the his studio, where the walls were even more cluttered. Lun Teep came in smiling broadly, and floated across the floor, asking me to please sit down, pointing matter-of-factly to the chair on the far side of the long oak table. We both sat down, and with the crack of a binder clip snapping to a clipboard, his entire face changed. Behind broad lenses, his old, tired eyes lit up. His face lengthened, and he exhaled lengthily. Reaching for a conte crayon, he began making quick, deep strokes with motions that seemed to place the pigment into the paper rather than upon it. He would sit with his hand poised as if ready to strike, and then, with a slight inhale, leap into a fury of activity. If I closed my eyes I could be next to the big, hairy, sweaty guy at the gym doing flies with too much weightthis was the extent of intensity in his breathing. As he put the finishing touches on the drawing, we talked about Matisse and elephants, and it was truly lovely. I had been introduced as a photographer, but after our conversation, he asked if I had studied art, and invited me to come back to visit him at the studio, to talk about the masters and to draw alongside him; I couldnt wait.
After he finished the sketch, he proceeded to show me some of his work. Then, all of a sudden, he cocked his head as if a dog hearing a distant, inaudible whistle, and with a mumbled sentence in Thai ran up the stairs to his lofted bedroom. Pee Ann said that he was going to get his dance costume, and we saw ourselves out. Back on the driveway a small grey haired man sang, pausing intermittedly to sip moonshine from his bamboo cup. Out of the darkness emerged Lun Teep, or at least the same body that had housed Lun Teep a few minutes earlier, only now he was transformed: his old body wrapped in a traditional costume, his large glasses hidden behind a beautiful Kabuki-style mask, his furious jerking movements replaced by the elegant long strokes that characterize traditional Thai dance.
I came to Gabfai to be part of a community of artists, and tonight I got my first real feeling of what this is like.