PERMEABLE PARAMETERS — Lara van Meeteren

Photo: Kornkrit Jianpinidnan

Lara van Meeteren is a researcher and cultural organiser working in Bangkok and Hong Kong. She is involved in long-running, collaborative projects that use texts as tools for discussion, experimentation, and sometimes frustration.

Most of her work happens through shared processes rather than finished outcomes. She is currently pursuing a PhD at Hong Kong Baptist University’s Academy of Visual Arts, where she is trying to make text-based commoning a thing.

Through Permeable Parameters, projects, research, and observational fieldnotes intersect to test the porosity of cultural infrastructure. Constructed in public, this online index is populated bit by bit as material is unearthed from phone camera roll, notes app, and shared Google Drive folders.

RESEARCH, PRACTICE & FIELDWORK

Art Events and Infrastructures in Asia
Researching macro-infrastructures, political economy, corporate real estate, and public art across Hong Kong and Asia.
- Bangkok Biennial Pavilion 'coming soon • เร็ว ๆ นี้' ↗ (Research project, interviews and multi-media installation, 2018)
- Public Art in the Private City: Control, Complicity and Criticality in Hong Kong (Open Philosophy, 2019)
- What Should Biennials Do? (Zine, 2019)
- Biennials and Hegemony: Experiences from the Thai Laboratory (OnCurating, 2020)
Cultural Commoning in Thailand
Investigating self-organisation, cultural commoning as resistance, and collective art practices across Thailand.
- [ inappropriate BOOK CLUB ] Common Dissent (Reading group & edited book, 2021)
  └─ [ Full Book in Thai ] ↗ └─ [ Introduction in English ] ↗
- Art Organisers as Commoners: On the Sustainability and Counter-Hegemonic Potential of the Bangkok Biennial ↗ (Social Inclusion, 2022)
- Artists as Organisers: Cultural Commoning and Hegemony in Thailand ↗ (Book chapter in The Rise of the Common City: On the Culture of Commoning, ASP, June 2022)
- Lecture at documenta fifteen: Commoning Curatorial and Artistic Education ↗ (2022)
- On the Ideological Flexibility of the Cultural Common(s): The Many Lives of Thailand’s Art Lane ↗ (OnCurating, Issue 52, November 2022)
- [ inappropriate BOOK CLUB ] Labour and Value in the Cultural Field
  └─ Reading and discussion meetings (2023) └─ We don't accept these terms. Labour and value in the cultural field (publication, 2025)
Text-Based Commoning
Active research on collaborative writing and publishing as method.
- On Text-Based Commoning ↗ (Book chapter in Future Book(s): Sharing Ideas on Books and (Art) Publishing, Valiz, June 2023)
- [ inappropriate BOOK CLUB ] ใช้ได้ Chai Dai (lexicon building and collaborative writing project, 2023-)
  └─ Workshop gatherings in Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Khon Kaen and Pattani (2023) └─ [ Chai Dai Platform ] ↗ └─ [ Chai Kham Dai — zine collection ] ↗ └─ สู่ปทานุกรมผู้ใช้งาน (Thai translation of Stephen Wright's 'Lexicon Toward Usership)
Fieldnotes
Notes from site visits to art organisations in Bangkok, Hong Kong and elsewhere. Slightly sanitized excerpts, added as they accumulate.
- [ FIELDNOTE 006 – Bangkok ] Ratchadamnoen Contemporary Art Center — O-NET (Jan 2026)
  To be added
- [ FIELDNOTE 005 – Bangkok ] Bangkok Kunsthalle — The Artist in Residence (Jan 2026)
  To be added
- [ FIELDNOTE 004 – Bangkok ] Ratchadamnoen Contemporary Art Center — The Sign-in Sheet (Jan 2026)
  To be added
- [ FIELDNOTE 003 – Bangkok ] Kinjai Contemporary — Remains (Jan 2026)
  To be added
- [ FIELDNOTE 002 – Bangkok ] Bangkok Kunsthalle — Free Icecream (Jan 2026)
  To be added
- [ FIELDNOTE 001 – Bangkok ] Kinjai Contemporary — Family Recipe (Dec 2025)
  To be added

On collaborative work & co-authorship

Although work is filed under my name in this index, the projects and related research are inherently collaborative and co-authored. They are the work of many and co-authorship acknowledges the shared labour, resources, and intellectual contributions involved across all initiatives. Specific co-authors and collaborators can be found by under each entry.