Immersed within this artistic formation are layers upon layers, running between reality and imagination, personal and historical context, objectivity and subjectivity, spatial and temporal stages. Photography has transformed from being simply a copy of nature into an artistic form, representing a creator’s aesthetic, cultural message and, frequently, social agenda.

Strata is this year’s pop-up exhibition project by PhotoBangkok, to reflect on contemporary social structure. In the current complex socio-political climate, nothing is as it seems. In this project, 7 artists, 5 exhibitions represent a wide variety of photographic genres and techniques, each with multifaceted elements and discourse, a diffusion of information and negotiation. Representing the European stratum, Luis del Amo, Madrid in Black and White, gives us a glimpse into Madrid’s glamorous past through his black and white 35mm and medium format films from his time as a fashion photographer. Decades later, in Expanse, Suzanne Moxhay, while inspired by the tradition of matte painting techniques, opts for digital tools to manipulate and construct a staged environment that negotiates the boundary between outside and inside, allowing an expansion of spatial mentality and physicality.

I love Thailand presents the work of two talented emerging Thai artists, Naraphat Sakarthornsap and Charinthorn Rachurutchata, who show Thai society through their fresh, yet critical mindsets. Rachurutchata, with her traditional upbringing, examines the phrase ‘I love you Thailand’, a common phrase Thai students are asked to repeat mindlessly at school. While Sakarthornsap emphasizes the importance of what (or whom) is discarded and rejected by society. Seen through the simplicity of beautiful floral arrangements in an ordinarily places, his work is a reflection of a society’s impact upon an individual.