PAM Public Lecture 08
Pirak Anurakyawachon
Spaceshift Studio (Thailand), A True Story
Firstly, it’s the first time ever that I’ve been to attend the public lecturers. It is a live lecture talk by Pirak Anurakyawachon. He is an architect turned editor for art4d magazine and Spaceshift Studio photographic director, based in Bangkok. Spaceshift studio has been photographing architecture, art, and design domestically and internationally. He loves to share his knowledge with the younger generation.
Speaker
Pirak Anurakyawachon
Born in 1974 and graduated in 1999 from the Faculty of Architecture at Silpakorn University in Bangkok. In 1997-1998, he began shooting buildings around Europe and interned with an architect in Holland. In 2000 as a cultural representative at Florida’s Walt Disney World, Pirak travelled around the United States to visit buildings and shoot them. Returning to Thailand in 2001, he worked as an architect for a year before going to work with the iconic Thai magazine, art4d, as a contributing editor.
Everyone will have noticed how much easier it is to get hold of a painting, more particularly a sculpture, and especially architecture, in a photograph than in reality.
I greatly admire him because he is freely share his knowledge and do not withhold important information. If anyone has a question, he will give a respectful answer. One of the highlight of this lecture is that “Architecture And Photography Come Together To Make Art Within Art”- said Pirak Anurakyawachon about his life as a photographer. This inspired me a lot. In my opinion, through photography one might be able to get hold of architecture. By this I mean, a photograph of it is able to isolate, define, interpret, exaggerate or even invent a cultural value for the physical building. Anything and everything that is photographed can be arranged on the page as a new and perhaps spurious kind of ‘visual knowledge’. For me I experience famous architecture through photographs. I mentally picture buildings even I haven’t been there.
His whole niche of architecture photography that’s more about how a building feels than how it looks.
He aims to create lasting visual impressions in an age when limitless architecture and design news can be digested and forgotten in seconds on the web. The photos acknowledge the emotional component of experiencing buildings and respond to it in kind. Virtually everywhere we go, we are surrounded by some sort of architecture on a daily basis. Because of this, it should come as no surprise that architecture is such a popular subject in photography. To him, one will able to develop his/her eye for architecture photography with practice. If the scenery compliments the building then shoot a wider photo, but if the surroundings don't fit with the message we want to convey, cut them out.
In conclusion, I admire his bravery of turned editor for art4d magazine instead of being an architect. I’ve also learned that the art of photographing architecture takes on many forms. Whether it is photographing the exterior or interior, many awesome images can be resulted with the correct techniques and more importantly, the observant eye to spot the different points of view.