‘SIMĀ,’ THE SECOND SOLO EXHIBITION BY CHAN CHAO-VACHARANONT SINVARAVATN, EXPLORES THE CONCEPT OF ‘BOUNDARIES’ THROUGH THE LENSES OF BUDDHISM, BELIEF SYSTEMS, LANDSCAPES, AND SPACES IMBUED WITH HUMAN-CREATED MEANING
Sīmā, the second solo exhibition by Vacharanont Sinvaravatn, takes its name from the Pali and Sanskrit word sīmā, meaning a boundary or border. In Buddhism, sīmā refers to a designated area in which monks perform formal acts of the monastic community. A more familiar manifestation may be the bai sema: carved stone markers that delineate the boundaries of sacred Buddhist grounds.
According to the Vinaya, the boundaries of a sīmā are defined by eight types of ‘nimitta,’ or boundary markers: a mountain, a rock, a forest, a tree, an anthill, a path, a river, and still water. Before maps and modern coordinate systems existed, recognizable features of the landscape served as shared points of reference, allowing people to understand where the boundaries of a sīmā lay.
