Interview #135— Mechelle Bounpraseuth
by Matt Chun
Mechelle Bounpraseuth is a Sydney-based ceramic artist. Through darkly humorous sculptural objects, Mechelle navigates the dirt, absurdity and banality of suburban Australiana, also exploring her identity as the first-gen daughter of Laotian refugee migrants.
Mechelle’s work has been exhibited at the National Gallery of Australia, Craft Victoria and Museum of Contemporary Art. Mechelle also makes drawings and zines.
Mechelle speaks to Matt Chun about ceramics, family and the familiar grotesque.
So, of course I have to start by asking about the moment that we find ourselves in. What does your daily life look like during the Covid-19 pandemic?
Since isolating myself, I don’t go to my studio as often as before. When I do go, my fellow ceram friends and I wave from afar and shout through closed windows. I’m mostly at home with my little family, something I’m really grateful for. I have a young baby. We do everything together and it’s the most wholesome and healing thing in my life. There’s lots of feeding, Montessori learning, playing, mess making, and nappy changing. When bubba goes to sleep I try to work—but mostly I just pass out next to her, wake up an hour later, try and slide off the bed, and quietly creep to the door, get a drink, get lost in the vacuum of instagram (watching videos of rescue dogs and cry while holding my dog), realise I’m procrastinating and then get to work on my ceramics.’
Tell me about your working from home set-up. What impact is this having on the objects you make?
I have a small home studio which is basically a table with basic tools and clay. I work when I can, sometimes really early in the morning or late at night when I can’t sleep. Being at home means focusing on smaller, intimate objects, using what’s accessible to me, thinking of new mediums to work with and revisiting old ways of working, like paper mâché and zine making. I’m re-drawing and adding to an old zine I made almost 10 years ago, illustrations of Laotian words and their literal translations into English. For example, a mole/beauty spot in Lao is ‘kee meng vun’ which when translated means ‘fly shit’.
Like many fellow creatives, I’ve lost income and have postponed many exhibition opportunities but still have to cover studio rent and material costs. But that anxiety can’t compare to those who are sick and really hurting. I’m just taking each day as it comes with gratitude for my health, family, and friends.
I’m really interested in your response to this question, as you work so decidedly within the Australian vernacular: What does an Asian-Australian Identity mean to you?
This is hard for me to answer since my identity is an ongoing navigation. Although I was born in Australia, I still experience racism and discrimination which greatly affects my sense of belonging. But I have found solidarity with other people of colour who share the same experience.
Not long after they came to Australia as refugee migrants, my parents converted from Buddhism to being Jehovah’s Witnesses. Growing up as a Jehovah’s Witness disconnected me from many aspects of Laotian and Australian culture, as we weren’t allowed to observe any customs and rituals interwoven with other faiths. Not being allowed to associate closely with non-Witnesses also meant that my parents were isolated from their community.
My mother was my only connection to Laotian culture – through hearing her sing Lao songs and share old stories. Stories about doing ‘the work of a man’ as a child and riding a water buffalo knee deep in the mud of the rice fields, or about how harsh life was under Communist rule, or how she missed her parents. When cooking grilled sticky rice cakes brushed with eggs, she told me how my grandmother ate too many and couldn’t poo for weeks! My favourite memories were making hand cut noodles, rolling spring rolls and eating them together. Any connection to my culture was through Mum and the immense love we had for each other. The loss of culture felt even more profound when my beautiful mother passed away from cancer.
In addition to what I’ve learned about my identity from my mother, there’s the process of unlearning the intergenerational trauma that comes with diaspora, which requires so much emotional labour. Reclaiming what was taken from me, valuing and honouring what I know, and connecting the past to the present is a form of decolonising in my practice and my cultural inheritance for my child.
Being at home means focusing on smaller, intimate objects, using what’s accessible to me, thinking of new mediums to work with and revisiting old ways of working, like paper mâché and zine making.
I was reading your zine—The Joy of Public Transport— again today. It includes your exquisite drawing of a scowling, open-mouthed woman flipping her middle finger:
One rainy morning at Ashfield station, I hear some someone shout across the platform to another commuter. For a moment I thought they were friends calling out to each other but then I realised the barefoot lady drenched in rain was telling someone to go fuck themselves and to go look in a fucken mirror.
So, conceptually, I feel like this is a good entry point to your ceramic practice. As a sculptor, the grimy, still-life tableaux that you create invites a wave of familiarity and nostalgia, but also disgust and discomfort, perhaps reflecting back on the viewer like a fucken mirror.
I love your description of my work! I was recently asked to describe it and I said it was like a trash can on fire. It’s pretty and ugly and smelly all at once. Or, like a pigeon eating vomit; it's familiar and gross, but also kinda sweet. I don’t actively go out looking for material, they’re just moments that I notice or things I’ve experienced and for whatever reason stay with me.
The Joy of Public Transport zine you referenced came from the need to process those everyday encounters I had with people and the things I observed on public transport. I find people really interesting—they can be so strange and scary and I guess by drawing them they don’t seem so intimidating.
I recently spoke with sculptor Chloe Smith, who similarly makes representations of food (in her case from felt) that can be both familiar and disgusting. We talked about applying the tradition of shokuhin sampuru to Australia’s kitsch suburban food culture. Are there some other cultural references that you’re particularly conscious of?
I use a lot of techniques and tools that are actually used in real cooking. I did a short course in Baking Skills at East Sydney Tech which is now the National Art School, funnily enough. Since mum worried a lot and thought I wouldn’t be safe on the train at night, she enrolled into the course as well. We had so much fun together and learnt so many new skills like cake decorating techniques. I still have the tools from my chef’s kit like piping nozzles, spatulas, icing combs and bowl scrapers but utilise them in my ceramic work. I reference the skills I learnt from observing the women in my family when they prepared meals, so I often treat clay like dough or an ingredient that I flatten with a rolling pin, chop with a knife and board, or snip with scissors.
You studied ceramics at the National Art School in Sydney. So did I, and it was a wonderful department. How did you initially come to clay? What do you love about it?
I started making ceramics six years ago. I left the Jehovah’s Witnesses in my mid 20’s. It was a religion that stifled any ambition, creativity and individual expression, so being an artist was a dream, something not within my reality. When I left I was lost, it had been my world. I was finally free, but had so much healing and unlearning to do in breaking down the system of control I grew up with.
Prior to leaving the Jehovah’s Witnesses, I met a beautiful boy who patiently waited for me and we later got married. He was an immense source of love and constant support whilst I waded through a sea of depression. I had never thought to ask myself, ‘What do I want to do?’ ‘What would make me happy?’. He lovingly asked me those questions one night when I was feeling particularly saddened and defeated. I answered ‘I want to make’. There was this instinctive desire to create that I was never allowed to truly flourish because it seemed fruitless. I enrolled into a TAFE ceramics course a few days later. I was so scared that my husband caught the train with me and walked me right up to the classroom door, all while telling me how proud he was of me.
I enrolled thinking I would make functional ware; be creative but create things with purpose (and, potentially make a living from it). I saw it as a purely practical endeavour. I didn’t imagine making art and how purposeful art for art's sake could be. Then I met an extremely kind and encouraging teacher named Lynda Draper. I showed her my zines that use humour to process traumatic things like racism and borderline poverty. She saw the value in my drawings and the potential in me. That's when I began to translate my drawings into clay. After a year I graduated and received Advanced Standing at National Art School and went straight into second year where I majored in Ceramics.
At first, clay intimidated me but then I relished the new skills I was learning. I had found a medium that I understood intuitively. At times working with clay is heartbreaking, you spend so much time labouring over a piece only for it to quite literally shit itself by cracking, collapsing, or exploding- or some other shitty thing occurs. Other times it turns out better than you could ever hope for. Clay can be a really joyful medium, it's tactile, messy. It kind of reminds me of poo and when it works, it is truly, a glorious thing.
I find people really interesting—they can be so strange and scary and I guess by drawing them they don’t seem so intimidating.
It’s lovely to hear of Lynda Draper’s influence. Who else are you inspired by?
My family is my greatest inspiration, my baby girl is a constant source of joy in my life. My husband is someone I admire very much. Now that he works from home, I can see firsthand how he works with such focus and dedication.
My sister is also an artist and I see how much she loves art and how hard she works to keep her practice going. I’m also inspired by my parents, who crossed the Mekong River and risked their lives so that we could have a better life. I speak a lot of the influence my mother had on my life and for that I will always be eternally grateful. I’m very much inspired by people who value working hard and who are resilient despite adversity. Their drive and work ethic propels me to be the same.
What are you listening to?
I’m laughing because I listen to Little Baby Bum Nursery Rhyme Friends. My baby dances as if she is doing a whole bunch of baby squats in time with the beat. It is the best. I also really love early nineties RnB so I’ve been listening to Mariah Carey and TLC while I work.
What are you reading?
Three books that I read every day and night, multiple times a day are The Very Hungry Caterpillar, We’re Going On a Bear Hunt and That’s Not My Sloth. They’re my daughter’s favourites right now so they’re on high rotation.
Other books that we read together regularly are from a series called Little People Big Dreams. They’re biographical books, mostly about women who have made great contributions to society through art, literature and science. What I love about them is they don’t shy away from talking about people's experiences with poverty, misogyny and racism. Yet they’re written in a sensitive way with a focus on overcoming adversity. I want my daughter to be empowered, so hearing these stories—particularly the stories of people of colour—I feel is really important.
What are you doing to look after yourself during this strange time?
I eat well to nourish my body and thoroughly enjoy the process of eating. I also try to listen to what I intuitively need, some weeks I’ll take it slow and nap when my baby does- it's so nice to fall asleep embracing a little human. Other days, I really feel the need to move so I’ll go for a jog in the park or walk around the block to feel connected to my body. I chill by watching Korean mukbang videos and playing Animal Crossing. I just wanna pull out those weeds, shake those trees, catch those rare fish, listen to Bella sing and wear cute clothes all day long! I’ve just learnt that you can cross pollinate flowers so I’m going to plant a whole sea of roses.
I want my daughter to be empowered, so hearing these stories—particularly the stories of people of colour—I feel is really important.
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Interview & drawings by Matt Chun