Inside the dark cavernous womb of Australian Centre for Contemporary Art’s main gallery, one will currently encounter Sorawit Songsataya’s Unnamed Islands (2023) as part of The Charge That Binds curated by Shelley McSpedden. Devoid of narrative, the video is intoxicating as it takes the viewer on a trip-like experience through time and space, across past and present and various geographical locations. It presents as both a dream-like hallucination and a science-fiction drenched virtual reality. Here, luminescent krill-like creatures flit around upon a black backdrop, while footage of a white bird manipulated post-production, give off an uneasy air of military surveillance.

Installed on an enormous screen that sits directly on the gallery floor, Unnamed Islands is, despite its formal qualities, focused on the very real nesting habits of the kōtuku, otherwise known as the white heron or Eastern egret. Filmed at Waitangiroto Nature Reserve in New Zealand/Aotearoa, this is just one of the kōtuku’s natural habitats—at other times of the year they can be seen across Asia and the Pacific, including Thailand, Songsataya’s other home outside of Aotearoa/New Zealand. The water creatures, I later learn, have been 3D scanned from foraminiferas by Foraminarium Laboratory Group, an Oregon State University research lab, which Songsataya explains were “once a marine organism, which died and accumulated on the seafloor to become limestone, to become land.” Meanwhile, a trance-like soundtrack that includes a khim—a traditional Thai instrument—hums along with the video.

The images that Songsataya depict have multiple meanings across various cultures. “There is a sense of duality here or realms of occupations (bird/sky with fish/forams/water) but also of possible plurality, entanglement and the unknown beyond,” they tell me. Watching Unnamed Islands, one becomes acutely aware of the multiple layers in each scene that represent Songsataya’s tireless research. “The white heron, to certain Māori hapū, accompanies the dead to the ‘leaping place’ where their spirits depart. In Southeast Asia, the motif of the bird can be seen on the surfaces of ancient Bronze Age drums associated with ritual ceremonies and funerals. So here one subject matter becomes many other things to many other people[and] cultures. Filming them at their only birthing and nesting site in Aotearoa, while understanding their many spiritual connotations, is a way for me to explore and expand the duration between birthing and the process of death.”

Songsataya moved to New Zealand from Chiang Rai, Thailand, in 2001. Since then, they have exhibited extensively, both locally and internationally and have undertaken several prestigious residencies. In 2024 alone, they exhibited in the Busan Biennale, had a major exhibition at the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery in New Plymouth, another solo at commercial gallery Robert Heald Gallery in Wellington, and undertook a residency at the Singapore Art Museum.

They are currently exhibiting again in Melbourne, this time in a group exhibition titled Image Economies at Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA), touted as “a timely reappraisal of how the digital, networked world permeates our offline lives.” In the exhibition, Songsataya is exhibiting a video titled Unnamed Makers (2023) that represents 3D reconstructions of snuff bottles from the Christchurch Art Gallery collection, as well as Ban Chiang and Japanese Jōmon pottery that the artist filmed in their respective countries. Of Unnamed Makers, Songsataya says “I was trying to unlearn the separation between hand-made objects and computer-generated works (3Dprinting, scanning). All objects in the video were made by someone we know nothing or very little about, and I’m fascinated by all the things that contribute to that process and duration of unknowability.”

In addition to seeking it out in their work, Songsataya is also drawn to the unknown in their day to day life. Recently, they have temporarily relocated to Bangkok from Auckland. Songsataya was born in Thailand, but in Chiang Mai (not to be confused with nearby Chiang Rai), a sleepy city in the north of Thailand surrounded by forest, it is a far cry from the intense metropolis of Bangkok. Now in Bangkok, they have signed a one-year lease on a two-storey townhouse. They plan to live and establish a studio upstairs. In New Zealand, Songsataya relied upon a lot of other paid work to make ends meet, which left little time for their actual practice. But this new setup allows Songsataya to focus more on research and artwork production. “Plus, Thailand and Southeast Asia are incredibly rich in cultural knowledge, especially in the areas where my research is heading around forms of audibility and inaudibility,” says Songsataya. They will investigate non-Western musical instrument making techniques as well as sedge-weaving (a traditional craft technique used to make household items) in their grand-mother’s hometown.

Forever thinking about next steps, Songsataya has plans for collaborating with artists in Bangkok. “Me and a dear friend who is Māori hope to establish an artist-led research residency on material culture here in Thailand and Southeast Asia, prioritising Pasifika and Māori artists and researchers,” Songsataya tells me. I ask if they ever tire of being so busy and having multiple projects on the go at once. But the answer is a resounding no. “I am doing what I love—exploring ideas, changes, and conversations through art—and am very privileged and cared for to have creative outlets [and] spaces to showcase and execute those ideas.”

The Charge That Binds
Australian Centre for Contemporary Art
(Melbourne/Naarm)
On now—16 March

Image Economies
Monash University Museum of Art
(Melbourne/Naarm)
On now—17 April

This article was originally published in the March/April 2025 print edition of Art Guide Australia.