Featured image: As I tickle you to Sleep I

As I Tickle You to Sleep is a short visual series portraying multiple themes: tending to the inner child who is restless because they haven’t giggled, and grieving the loss of children who were not brought to this life due to colonial violence.

This exhibition is a practice of rewiring neural pathways through art-making. Papatson uses colorful synthetic fur to convey a soft, yet fabricated, comfort. This framing and holding provide a psychological semblance within their emotional landscape.

In each piece, the painting is done intuitively and meditatively, with zero noise or sound, creating a hypnosis-like state where the hands become the channeler of the spirit.

As I Tickle You to Sleep seeks to stretch our capacity to feel and care deeply for every speck of our inner well-being, using our vulnerability for collective world-building.

Papatson Suphavai‘s exhibition is on view from August 20 – September 22, 2024

With the guidance of love, ancient medicine, community, and healing rituals, Papatson Suphavai channels sacred, psychological imagery and messages from the other dimensions to the known reality with art-making. They build the unseen worlds through intuitive painting, styling and cultural curation.

Papatson Suphavai is inspired by collective liberation, brown & queer diasporic dreams, cosmology, history reclamation, and the full spectrum of what it means to be here, to be well and free.

They are a coactivator to a home studio turned creative wellness hub in West Oakland, CA with Jazmine Kravitz called Lén Sol. Lén Sol is a third space for creatives to reimagine how we experience art, culture, wellness, and connection.

Learn more about Papatson’s work by visiting their website and following their Instagram:

Website: papatson.com

Instagram: @spapatsons

Small case

LÉN SOL STUDIOS FLYER
Poster
11″ x 17″
2024

Big case
Left to right

As I tickle you to Sleep I
Acrylic and gouache on canvas with synthetic fur
23” x 26”
2024

As I tickle you to Sleep II 
Acrylic and gouache on canvas with synthetic fur and projected looped video 
15” x 15”
2024
 

As I tickle you to Sleep III
Acrylic and gouache on canvas with synthetic fur
23” x 26”
2024

The Ramp Gallery is an artist-driven exhibition space at SOMArts that is currently accepting applications for four-week long solo and group shows. An opportunity for entrepreneurial artists to ramp up their careers by exhibiting at one of San Francisco’s most dynamic hubs for art and community, the high-visibility location of The Ramp Gallery is adjacent to the main entrance of SOMArts and open to all local artists in the Bay Area. To learn more about the space please visit, The Ramp Gallery.