Bangkok--11 Jul--Shangri-La Hotel, Bangkok
The horizontal dimension of Shangri-La Hotel, Bangkok's Krungthep Wing wall is a huge canvas for The Netherlands-based artist Daan Botlek, who transformed it into a pool in the Bangrak community using his mysterious and fascinating artistic imagination. Next to his aesthetic painting is a large black and white artwork recently painted by artist Luke Satoru representing a map of some interesting landmarks, including arts, culinary and hospitality in Bangrak District.
Daan's minimalist-style painting of Paradise on the River adds colour to the little road beside the hotel that leads people from the BTS Saphan Taksin Skytrain Station to Sathorn Pier. As the hotel is located next to the Chao Phraya River, he illustrated the painting in the form of life along the river. To draw people coming from Sathorn Pier, Daan has made small images of people walking up to the main road towards the bigger picture of his creation. He painted the wall a little bit more vertical and compact, hoping that some would notice the body parts are connected and stack the photo's art to create a bigger image.
Some viewers may imagine his painting to be green plants growing on two sides of the river or floating on the river, and some may think of the clouds floating in the sky. For the great waves rolling into shore, Daan wanted to have a twilight effect with very light pink water and everything else in the picture vividly shown. The islands and rocks are a warm, dark green and the effect of the cresting waves against the rocks are grayed-out blue green, darker than the actual colour of the rocks, with a little warm top light reflecting on the top edges of the effect.
The horizontal view of a people swimming in the water also shows some of this reflected warmth and relaxation. The vertical view shows this people standing and waving a hand, for instance. Daan made sure that one really vivid spot in the picture is the people and the body.
The Netherlands-based artist worked days and nights for more than 10 days to complete his painting on the Krungthep Wing wall. His art creation helps elevating the awareness towards the importance of art and creativity for this destination hub that has an average of 30,000 tourists and general public pass by every day.