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Rumors from the sea is a site specific sound installation composed of hundreds of bamboos, usually used in Thailand as seawalls to slow coastal erosion, with a flute at their top. A bamboo-flutes orchestra played by the waves, performing unique concerts 24 hours a day, depending of the tide, the direction, tempo and force of the waves. As a potential listener, you are invited to define the beginning and the end of the music piece played for you. Project done in collaboration with the Bambugu’s builders and the students of Ban Klong Muang School. We imagine together a creature that could come from the sea to help humans to fight climate change: the installation is a call to listen to it singing, it screaming, while it tries to stop the waves. During a musical performance, the children have been playing flute on the beach to call this being, resulting in a short film.

Thailand Biennale, Edge of the wonderland / thailandbiennale.org

Krabi 2018, from 2nd of November 2018 until 29th of February 2019

Exhibitions: Thailand Biennale (Th), Taipei National University of the Arts (Tw), Museo Reina Sofia (Es),



The location

A central floating pier at Ko Kwang allows you to appreciate the concert surrounded by the flutes and waves, arranged around the small platform at the end of the jetty.





In collaboration with the children from Ban Klong Muang School : Teepakorn Raksakul, Muhammad Sufyan Wani, Al Buddru Wani, Thanawat Srimun, Sarayuth Cheu-sanga, Apiwat Nareemont, Teerathep Some-sa, Anawin Prakorbsub, Urassaya Kebutr, Benyanee Prabdin, Natapat Thongsai, Waranya Punchung, Nithiphorn Prabdin, Sitarat Butrkrai, Janthima Wanpaet, Muna Dumdee, Krisneerin Prabdin, Narumon Sochua, Dusadeephorn Yongkul & Ornpreeya Srimun.

and the Bambugu Team: Piyasak Chantharangsi, Somkid Ongmalee, Aadad Ongmalee, Vitharn Nguemdee, Sathian Chantabutr, Prasan Polakom, Somkiat Jaejang, Somporn Ongmalee, Soman Udy, Garnett Kwan & Andadan Chatt.

WORKSHOP with the children from Ban Klong Muang (pictures by Kornkaew Nokkaew & Félix Blume)

A project coordinated by Punch Viratmalee (Curatorial Assistant).

Curatorial Team : Jiang Jiehong (Lead Curator), Vipash Puricha (Curator Assistant), Yuko Hasegawa (Artistic Director Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; International Advisory Board Member), Kornkaew Nokkaew (Curatorial Assistant), Ajjana Wajide (Curatorial Assistant).

OCAC : Nupin Nantakiat, Oraphin Vipatanakumjorn

Workshop coordinated by Wilaiwan Prathumwong

Teacher: Somsak Phechyot

Making off & Social Media by Paspimol Padermprach

Drone Images by Thai News Agency Channel 9 MCOT, Supachat Supametee & Phongnaris Dejfuang.

Many thanks to all the people involved in the project and mentioned above, as well as Francis Alÿs, Sara Lana, Daniel Godínez Nivón, Erick Meyenberg, Ana Cecilia Medina, Andres Blume, Marie-Christine Cabanas, Samuel Blume, Lionel Sautez, Song Pron Wood Krabi & Sureepan Srimun.

SITE CONSTRUCTION by Bambugu team

The Facts

Inhabitants from Khlong Prasong, close to Krabi town, have moved 5 times in the last 30 years, not because of their itinerant lifestyle, but because of coastal erosion. A small village close to Bangkok (Ban Khun Samut Chin) is disappearing because of the rising of sea level. Those are two examples among others and locals use makeshift bamboo seawalls to break the waves, trying to slow the sea level from rising.



Technical Approach

Each one of the bamboo stick has at his top a small flute (upside down), based in the sonority of the Thailand flute (Khlui) and tuned on a pentatonic scale (from G4 to A5). At the bottom of the bamboo, a lateral hole lets the water come in and out. Each wave comes inside the tube (the bamboo has no inner separation), pushing the column of air until the flute is played by the sea.

Some of the flutes have been done by the children: one for them to keep (that they used during the performance) and others to be used at the top of the bamboos of the installation.

Sketch of the bamboo-flute here

Download here full-res pictures from the installation