Nightlife nostalgia, courtesy of Thai-born, Lyon-based artist Jiab Prachakul. This intimate painting, which won the 2020 BP Portrait Award, shows two friends sharing a candid moment in a Berlin bar. “There is no posturing or posing, not even any direct eye contact. Instead, Prachakul encapsulates a more contemporary notion of what family can be,” wrote Holly Black in her 2020 feature on the artwork for Elephant. “Our circle of friends… makes us who we are,” Prachakul told Black. “Jeonga [Choi] and Makoto [Sakamoto] are like family to me. We are all outsiders, Asian artists living abroad, and their deep friendship has offered me a ground on which I can stand and embrace my own identity.”
