มอด มอด Weevils in Rice

“On Sifting for Purity: That Annoying Little Black Speck is a Weevil”

Where there is dirt there is system. Dirt is the by-product of a systematic ordering and classification of matter, in so far as ordering involves rejecting inappropriate elements. This idea of dirt takes us straight into the field of symbolism and promises a link-up with more obviously symbolic systems of purity. – Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger [1]

Questions regarding the ideal of white, clean, and high-quality rice and the journey of the grains we consume every day lead to the latest series of works by Kanokwan Sutthang. In the exhibition Weevils in Rice, the weevil, a member of the snout beetle family whose Thai name phonetically echoes the word for extinction, is positioned as the main protagonist. Through this figure, the work questions rice production processes, methods of cleaning and exclusion, the standards of whiteness, and the friction between the natural and the industrial. Although it is a natural inhabitant of rice, the weevil is perceived by humans as a disruptive agent that unsettles systemic procedures and challenges our preoccupation with cleanliness and the desire for flawless, industrial purity.

Kanokwan Sutthang’s past work attends to the small things often overlooked by most, such as pebbles in rice, Mimosa Pudica, Spear Grass, or weeds. These minute elements, typically regarded as human adversaries, occupy the smallest of our spaces. Yet their discovery often leads to phenomenons far greater than their physical size, and inevitably trigger a process of eradication, much like the weevils in rice.

One weevil mother can lay more than 300 eggs
The artist begins with a straightforward study of biology, as seen in the drawing Weevil in Rice (มอดในข้าว) (2025) . This work illustrates the cycle of a single weevil: from an egg laid within a rice grain, through its growth inside, emerging into a mature insect. [2]  The work 330 Eggs and 10 Pellets (2025)  translates this data into abstract painting. A single oval represents one grain of rice, the site where a female weevil lays a single egg. Throughout the weevil’s brief lifespan, it can produce up to 330 eggs. [3] While chemical fumigation might eliminate these insects one by one, the piece also abstracted from a view of rice warehouses, whether from news reports or in her hometown of Ubon Ratchathani. [4] The overlapping ovals evoke endlessly towering stacks of rice sacks and the scale of macro-consumption. [5]  Another drawing, titled  In the Fumes (ในไอรม) (2026) , employs patterns suggestive of Esoteric Abstraction. Yet this is not an image of a higher dimension; instead, it depicts Aluminum Phosphide pellets [6] as they evaporate into a lethal gas.

Obsession with Cleanliness
The Rinsing Rice (ซาวข้าว) (2025–26) painting series illustrates the process of rinsing rice before cooking. Consisting of paintings of various sizes, the works are rendered on cheesecloth, which serves as both a filter and a mediator between the clean and the dirty. The artist captures the stages of this process with simple clarity: the stillness of the water, the pouring, the cloudy liquid. There is a faint appearance of a hand—stirring, measuring the water level with an index finger, or cradling the rice to prevent it from spilling. The artist meticulously employs the delicate, fluid lines and light layers of color to convey a sense of gentle meditation, reflecting the care of the food preparer. It is a labor of love that evokes domestic warmth, the scent of new rice cooked by a mother, the comfort of a hot meal. Conversely, the hand can be viewed as a symbol of human intervention: a series of exhaustive cleansing steps and immense effort expended solely to achieve a state of hygiene and unblemished purity, [7] which effectively mirrors our obsession with cleanliness.

Returning to the Isan Homeland
The work  As Rice Becomes (2026) consists of five plates stacked atop a sack, each progressively smaller, whiter, and shinier. Crafted from five types of clay color-matched to rice grains, the piece narrates the milling process—a refinement that whittles something already small into something yet smaller. In industrial mills, rice is often polished and buffed up to five times. Additionally, the work references ancient folklore and the legend of the rice goddess, Phra Mae Phosop. It is believed that in the past, rice grains were as large as gourds and flew into granaries of their own accord. However, when humans committed immoral acts, the rice was shattered, scattered, and became smaller and smaller. [8] This hand-molded ceramic work utilizes handbuilding, the most simple technique since the dawn of our civilization. Particularly in the Southern China region, life has been intertwined with rice farming since the Neolithic period.

The video installation on the upper floor, A Ballad of Rice Weevil (ลำมอด) Z2026), which marks the artist’s first venture into the medium, sends drifting melodies down to the lower gallery. The work is a result of a collaboration with several young Isan thinkers. The short and long form folk narrative singing (Klon Lam Tang San and Lam Thang Yao) was composed by Panupong Thongsi and sung by Papitchaya Kulporn. It recounts the local folklore of the Stone and the Shell, which belong to the Phongsawadan Khun Borom (the Chronicles of Khun Borom). According to the legend, Khun Borom was the son of the superior spirit Phya Thaen, and the myth originally concerned the founding of civilization. However, the author has added a new fable regarding the origin of the weevil, suggesting that it was born from red earth. [9] The performance also features anti-weevil incantation inspired by the “pests prevention spells” of the respected late Isan scholar Preecha Phinthong [10] and the “Isan Rice Soul Calling Ritual” [11] used to worship the goddess of rice. [12] Despite its solemn sound, the lyrics are filled with humor. The video is projected onto thin cheesecloth, the same material the artist uses in her paintings, and presents a microscopic view of weevils crawling freely, moving in and out of hollowed grains, the only moment in this exhibition where viewers get to see them in their living state.

An Object of Exclusion
A wall-mounted lightbox, From the Field (มาแต่นา) (2026), illuminates a pencil drawing of a landscape, depicting the red earth path from the artist’s home to the rice mill. The rendering is almost shy in its softness, creating a sharp contrast with the industrial steel perforated sheet that obscures the front. Much like the cheesecloth, this metal piece is an instrument of the milling process, designed with various hole sizes to sift, separate, and extract impurities. It is an object of exclusion, functioning to filter and draw the boundaries between the clean and the soiled. Within these holes, the artist has packed dead weevils, stone fragments, and broken rice, serving as material witnesses to the friction between nature and machinery. This work signals a shift in the artist’s practice toward using industrial materials to collide with the subtle quality of her landscape drawings.

A Straightforward Conclusion

A hand-drawn diagram serves as a guide for the entire exhibition, documenting the artist’s understanding of the industrial rice system and the weevils intertwined with it. As in her previous creations, Kanokwan Sutthang’s artistic language remains simple, gentle, and sincere: a straightforward portrayal of the mundane.

Notably, the artist’s approach does not attempt to anthropomorphize the weevils. This aligns with the discourse of Critical Animal Studies and Post-humanist critique, which suggests that attempting to speak for other species or humanizing animals is often futile and reflects an anthropocentric viewpoint, one where humans unconsciously patronize other living beings.

The artist’s simple storytelling thus avoids a colonial gaze and does not infringe upon the essence of other lives, instead treating them as co-habitants of the world.

Simultaneously, the presentation of rice and the selection of what we consume, and what we consider contaminants, invites us to reflect on the politics of screening and the obsession with purity. These concepts are ultimately not confined to rice but permeate every fiber of existence and the society that operates within endlessly recurring structures.

[1] Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger (New York: Routledge, 2002), 44; as quoted in Walking Is an Act of Seeing Is an Act of Reading Is an Act of Walking by Hendrik Folkerts, Mousse Magazine, published July 14, 2020. Accessed: https://www.moussemagazine.it/magazine/walking-act-seeing-act-reading-act-walking-hendrik-folkerts-2020

[2] The weevil, scientifically known as Sitophilus oryzae, belongs to a family of beetles that first evolved over 300 million years ago. It is believed that they adapted to become agricultural pests approximately 10,000 years ago, when humans first began practicing agriculture. Based on an interview with Dr. Pongthep Akratanakul.

[3] The weevil’s egg is known to be very resilient. It requires extreme heat or cold to eliminate, and even the chemicals used to kill the mature weevil often have no effect on the egg.

[4] This series is not Sutthang’s first exploration of the rice industry. In 2024, the artist created Road of Rocks in Rice, which featured a large diagram of the rice production process on rice sacks overlaid with her personal experience of accidentally biting a pebble in her rice and cracking a tooth. It was exhibited at the Bangkok Art and Culture Centre alongside Khao Pan Khon (2024), an installation crafted from sticky rice

[5] Rice is a staple food for more than half of the global population. Thailand produces over 30 million tons of rice annually. Around half of this production is consumed domestically while the other half is exported, although these proportions cab vary each year. Source: Thai PBS, ชะตากรรม “ข้าวไทย” เผชิญคู่แข่งรอบด้าน ชาวนาจะรอดอย่างไร, published November 6, 2025. https://www.thaipbs.or.th/news/content/358276.

[6] 3–4 pellets per ton of rice; information gathered from the artist’s field research.

[7] Rinsing rice is typically done 2–3 times. Some believe it removes amylose, a component of starch coating the grain’s surface, which prevents the cooked rice from being too gummy. It also serves to remove impurities such as insects, dust, and contaminants like arsenic. However, rinsing rice can strip away nutrients and vitamins by as much as 20%, and in some cases, up to 50–70%.

Source: Jo Adetunji, “Do You Need to Wash Rice Before Cooking?”, The Conversation UK, June 12, 2023, accessed January 27, 2026,https://theconversation.com/do-you-need-to-wash-rice-before-cooking-heres-the-science-204692;and @Nicks Kitchen, Why You Should Wash Rice, YouTube, September 29, 2025, https://www.youtube.com/shorts/dgIvN5a0qkA

In May 2024, Deputy Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai led the media to inspect the final batch of Jasmine rice from the rice pledging scheme, which had been stored for 10 years in a warehouse in Surin Province. To prove its safety, he had the rice cooked and ate it in front of the press, noting that the rice had to be washed 15 times.

Source: “10-year-old rice that ‘Phumtham’ ate to prove its safety: who will the government sell it to?”, BBC News Thailand, May 7, 2024, accessed January 27, 2026, https://www.bbc.com/thai/articles/c0432xnedljo

[8] Preecha Kanthiya, ed., Thai Life Series: Worshiping Phya Thaen, Office of the National Culture Commission, Ministry of Culture; and Iem Thongdee, Rice Culture: Rituals Concerning Rice and Farming (Bangkok: Sahadhammik Co., Ltd., 1994

[9] Red earth is a feature used to pave rural roads in Thailand.

[10] The “pests prevention spell,” as rice seeds planted into the fields are often threatened by dangers, as pests are considered a major disease […] Cast the protective mantra as follows: “Om, red-mouthed caterpillar. Om, hot-mouthed stink bug. Be gone in three days, be gone today. Om, python-neck, striped-neck. Be gone in three days, be gone today […] My mind is more resolute than yours. I shall scatter these incantations to encircle the farm and the field. Om Kat-sa-ha. Om Kat-ta-ti. Om Tom-toy-bai-soy-som-sri. Om Som-sri, sprout and flourish, Yatha vari vaha pura saphah […]” Preecha Phinthong, Ancient Isan Mantras, Volume 1, Siritham Press (1974: Ubon Ratchathani).

[11] Iam Thongdee, Rice Culture: Rituals Concerning Rice and Farming (Bangkok: Sahadhammik Co., Ltd., 1994).

[12] The Isan Rice Soul Calling Ritual is performed after the rice has been brought into the granary, in order to soothe the spirit of Phra Mae Phosop and invite her to stay and protect the granary.

[13] Bojana Piškur, Trees, “More-Than-Human Collectives,” E-flux Issue 119 June 2021. Accessed: https://www.e-flux.com/journal/119/402976/trees-more-than-human-collectives.