Yellowmenace: Puck: Mai-Land

September 28, 2018

Puck: Mai-Land

Primarily a Thai comic book artist, Puck aka Tripuck Supawattana has diversified into several other disciplines, GIFs, art toys, animation, illustrating for apparel & print ads. Because he is a prolific creator I have devoted 3 posts to his art. In this installment, I focus on his personal works which are essentially cynical political cartoons criticizing issues which plague Thailand.

Puck ไตรภัค สุภวัฒนา (fb.com/pppuck) via: YellowMenace Blog

▶ See more Puck Art: Thai Bad Boy & Scary Sketches

The Thai word, "mai" has different meanings depending on spelling & intonation, but the 2 most common meanings are "No (ไม่)" & "Isn't it? (ไหม)". Both words work for this post in pointing out what is wrong in Thai culture & some of these problems seem to defy common sense causing people to give up out of confusion & frustration - "Whatever!".

On Feb 4, 2018 Thai forestry officials caught Premchai Karnasuta, the president of the Italian-Thai Development Co. poaching in a protected national forest sanctuary with 9 animal carcasses including a rare black panther. Because of his wealth & status police have been slow to press any charges & Premchai has missed several appointments to report to a police station after posting bail. This incident highlighted the double standard in Thailand where rich individuals become too big to go to jail. This caused outrage in Thailand leading protests & many Thai artists producing art to try to draw more attention to this issue.

Prayut Chan-o-cha (ประยุทธ์ จันทร์โอชา) T-shirt @ AMPBKK

Red shirt vs. Yellow shirt crisis which led to Thailand's current junta government. Elections are coming in early 2019 which could lead to a flare up of these simmering issues.