Name: The Eighth Liu Kang Annual Lecture | Phaptawan Suwannakudt: Reconfiguring the Mural by Dr Yvonne Low
Start: 2026-07-18T14:00:00+08:00
Location: 1 St. Andrew’s Road, Singapore, Singapore 178957

The Eighth Liu Kang Annual Lecture | "Phaptawan Suwannakudt: Reconfiguring the Mural" by Dr Yvonne Low
Sat 18 July | 2pm - 3pm | National Gallery Singapore, City Hall Wing, Level B1, The Ngee Ann Kongsi Auditorium | Free, registration required: https://www.nationalgallery.sg/sg/en/talks/Eighth-Liu-Kang-Annual-Lecture-Phaptawan-Suwannakudt-Reconfiguring-the-Mural.html
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The Eighth Liu Kang Annual Lecture explores the evocative practice of Phaptawan Suwannakudt, tracing her journey from traditional Thai temple mural painting to a later diasporic practice that unfolds across Australia and beyond. Trained within a male-dominated tradition, she reconfigures the mural as a living field of memory, translation, and exchange.
Drawing on feminist and postcolonial perspectives, the lecture considers how her work reshapes ideas of gender, lineage, and cultural movement, with particular attention to projects such as the reconstruction of her father’s murals at Wat Theppol and a collaboration at the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre, offering a rich reflection on tradition in transformation.
Following the lecture, Dr Adele Tan will join this session as discussant.
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About the Speaker & Discussant
Dr Yvonne Low is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Sydney, where she teaches Asian modernities, gender and sexuality in Asian art, and curating across undergraduate and postgraduate levels. Her research focuses on feminist art history, recovering marginalised histories through decolonial, feminist, and digital methodologies. She co-convened the Gender in Southeast Asian Art Histories conferences (2017, 2019) and the ongoing Sydney Asian Art Series. She serves on the editorial committee of Southeast of Now and has advised The Flow of History (AWARE/AAA). Current projects include a special journal issue on "Feminist Writings in Southeast Asian Art", "The Womanifesto Way: Online Anthology", and the "Artists Trajectories Map" (ArTM).
Dr Adele Tan received her PhD in art history from the Courtauld Institute of Art, London and is Senior Curator and Assistant Director of Curatorial Programmes at National Gallery Singapore. Her research focuses on modern and contemporary art in Southeast Asia and China. She also lectures in Art History at the National University of Singapore.
Her exhibitions include the 2023 Ng Teng Fong Roof Garden commission by Mumbai-based artist Shilpa Gupta, the solo retrospective "Kim Lim: The Space Between" in 2024 and the revamped DBS Singapore Gallery, "Singapore Stories: Pathways and Detours in Art" in 2025, and most recently in 2026, "Passion is Volcanic: Desire in Southeast Asian Art". She is currently preparing for a major monographic survey of Thai artist Montien Boonma in 2027.
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Image credit: Phaptawan Suwannakudt, "Hidden Screens: Laplae" (2005), Installation: painted screens, embroidery and fabric, Exhibition view of "Until We Meet Again", Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC). Image courtesy of the artist. Photo by Aroon Peampoonsopon
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