#052/05 October 4, 2005
Remarks by U.S. Ambassador Ralph L. Boyce
U.S. Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation Ceremony
American Corner, Chiang Mai University
October 4, 2005
(As Prepared for Delivery)
Thank you, Bea.
This is a delightful occasion for me. It is not often that I have the opportunity to announce wonderful news in person, and to deliver a large check. But that is a central idea of the Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation – to allow me to express personally to Thailand the great respect that my country has for Thai heritage.
The Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation was established by the US Congress in 2001. It allows American Ambassadors to support efforts of the host country to rescue cultural heritage that is fragile and in danger of being lost forever.
Each year since its inception, the Ambassador’s Fund has helped preserve Thai cultural heritage. In the first year, it supported Kamthieng House at the Siam Society. In 2002, the Antique Textile Collections at National Museum Bangkok received assistance. In 2003, the Fund contributed to the preservation of traditional Thai textile pattern and weaving techniques at the Golden Jubilee Royal Goldsmith College, at the Grand Palace. And last year, the Fund supported the creation of a digital archive of southern Thailand’s Islamic architectural heritage. This year we turn to north Thailand, to the mural at Wat Baan Koh.
“Heritage” has many forms, both tangible and intangible: monuments, buildings and objects, songs, instruments and folktales, jewelry and clothing, memories and knowledge. It is a difficult task to identify the most important heritage in urgent need of preservation, and the limited funds for this work are highly sought after. This year the Ambassador’s Fund supports 87 projects in 76 different countries, worldwide. Two-and-a half- million dollars is being dispersed. I am proud to say that the Wat Baan Koh project is receiving one of the most significant grants in the world this year, more than 2 million baht. It is the largest single grant being given in all of East Asia.
Let’s look at this project. In the 1930s, a devout and creative monk came to the newly-built Wat Baan Koh and covered its walls with his imagination, inspired by the wat’s palm leaf manuscripts of jatakas and the Ramayana. He painted faces of the monks he knew and faces of visitors, and gave the wat a contemporary look very different from the formal, elegant paintings that we associate with religious buildings. He showed that the stories of Buddha and Rama have intimate connections to the way people should live every day.
I imagine that people at the time hoped that future generations would value the artist’s vision. Their hope was well placed, since the Baan Koh Village [in Thai “Moo Baan Baan Koh”] and the monks of the Wat honored this obligation. All these years, they alone have kept the paintings and the building in good repair. This has been a difficult task. The building leaks, as old buildings do, and the paintings are slowly wearing away. It is time now for us to help them.
Ajarn Vithi and Associate Professor M.L. Surasawasdi and their team of scholars from Chiang Mai University and Naresuan University are committed to assist in the care of Wat Baan Koh. Over the next 18 months, the team will not only repair the building and preserve the mural, but in doing so will also create a lasting relationship between the wat and village and the larger community of Lampang, Chiang Mai, and beyond, to safeguard this heritage. These connections are exactly the “culture” that we want to preserve. The world is better when we are connected like this: when one artist in one wat in one village creates something so beautiful that the entire country and world beyond stops to look and becomes happier and more peaceful. Wat Baan Koh has provided peace and beauty for many years, and will now continue to do so. I like to think that the Wat Baan Koh monk-artist would be pleased.
So, if the President of Chiang Mai University would join me here.
I would like to present you with this check, representing the total amount of the grant to Chiang Mai University and your team of preservationists.
I look forward very much to visiting the project in 2007 to see the results and celebrate the beginning of a new life for Wat Baan Koh.