Announcing the artists selected for the inaugural Lab X residency!

We’re proud to be supporting Lab X, a new artistic collaboration between the United Kingdom and Thailand, through our Connections Through Culture grant programme. Lab X demonstrates the power of artistic exchange, opening doors to new and exciting opportunities for Thai and UK artists. This new collaboration is supporting diversity in our arts sector through mentorship, artistic dialogues and cross-sector support. We’re proud to be supporting this project which is aiming to tackle some of the challenges faced by artists working internationally — from shifting environments and the on-going effects of COVID-19.

Danny Whitehead, Country Director at the British Council in Thailand

We’re thrilled to announce that Nawarat ‘Nammon’ Welployngam and James Gallego Olivo have been selected to participate in Lab X, a pilot artistic residency and cultural exchange between Thailand and the UK, supported by the British Council’s Connections Through Culture programme. 

Along with Creative Migration, an international arts organisation based in Los Angeles and Bangkok, we have co-designed Lab X, a nine-month artist development programme, to confront the profound challenges faced by artists and producers working internationally. Bangkok-based artist and activist Nawarat ‘Nammon’ Welployngam and London-based movement practitioner and dancer James Gallego Olivo were selected by a committee formed of Artsadmin and Creative Migration representatives. James will spend two weeks at Creative Migration’s flagship hub Bangkok 1899 in Thailand in August 2024. Nammon will travel to Toynbee Studios, our home in east London for a two-week residency in September 2024. Both artists will be accompanied by a producer from their home organisation, receive a £1000 fee, mentorship, and a materials budget. Lab X offers a unique opportunity to connect emerging artists, producers and arts sectors across the two nations, creating a vital space for cross-collaboration between artists, organisation, disciplines, and contexts. 

Lab X offers a transformative journey where boundaries dissolve, creativity thrives, and connections transcend borders. I’m eager to immerse myself in this vibrant exchange of ideas and cultures, forging new paths in artistic expression.

Nawarat ‘Nammon’ Welployngam

I’m very excited and grateful for the opportunity to focus and develop my practice, while gaining experience and knowledge from other cultures, exploring how this will intertwine with my approach to my art and world perspective.

James Gallego Olivo

Nawarat ‘Nammon’ Welployngam is the founder of COMMUNITY LAB in Nang Loeng, Bangkok. With a passion for social change and cultural preservation, she has dedicated her life to empowering her community through art and collective action. As an artist, Nammon’s work explores themes of identity, community, and the urban landscape, often using mixed media and public installations to provoke dialogue and inspire change. Through the establishment of COMMUNITY LAB, Nammon has created a vital space for collaboration, knowledge-sharing and advocacy, enriching the cultural fabric of Nang Loeng and beyond. James Gallego Olivo is a movement practitioner and dancer based in London, who currently lectures at the London Contemporary Dance School. His work and research are heavily influenced by Hip Hop, which he blends with contemporary references and improvisation. He has worked with a variety of dance, theatre and film choreographers and directors including Jasmin Vardimon, Akram Khan, Hannes Langolf, Joan Clevillé, James Cousins, Jess & Morgs Films, Alleyne Dance, Antler Theatre, Company Nil, Frauke Requardt/David Rosenberg, Jason Mabana, and BULLYACHE.

Lab X is the kind of fluid, cross-cultural exchange that Bangkok 1899 has always strived for. Whether you call it a social sculpture, relational aesthetics and/or art & social practice, Lab X gives each artist the time to think, daydream, connect, and just be. There is no pressure to produce a concrete outcome. We are so grateful to the British Council that they acknowledge that artists need renewal, space and rest within their practice. Our team is enthusiastic about James’ collaborative performance skills and artistic vision, which embodies the ethos of Creative Migration. We are committed to fostering a supportive and inclusive environment where creativity thrives, and we believe that James’ practice aligns with our local community of Nang Loeng, which is rooted in Lakhon Chatri dance.

Susannah Tantemsapya, Founder and Executive Director of Creative Migration / Bangkok 1899 

Lab X sits within our Artist Support Programme Lab, a micro residency designed to provide artists with time, space, and money to develop their practice, without expectation of delivery. With Lab X, we take Lab to an international level, opening our organisation to host a Thai-based artist and providing a portal by which they can exchange and extend their practice alongside a UK-based practitioner. We were inspired and touched by Nammon’s social practice, by her community leadership, and by the ways in which she is exploring technology’s role in preserving traditional practices. In hosting Nammon, we hope to learn from her as much as we hope to offer, and to continue Artsadmin’s mission of supporting artists sitting in the spaces between disciplines investigating issues of social and climate justice.

Valentina Vela, Artist Support Programme Producer at Artsadmin