Pornpimon “Mew” Mingmitmee

Owner, Craft Colour

Industry : The Arts

For Pornpimon “Mew” Mingmitmee, colour carries knowledge. The Sakon Nakhon-based artist and natural-colour researcher has built her practice around understanding how pigments were once made, what local materials went into them and how that knowledge can find a place in contemporary art.

Her interest began with two strands: a family background in textiles and research into mural-painting conservation, where she studied the creation and use of traditional colours in Thai art. That enquiry eventually led to Craft Colour, through which she develops natural dyes, watercolours and artist materials using techniques informed by historical pigment making.

The research reaches beyond Thailand, with Mew studying colour traditions from different cultures before exploring how they can be adapted using Thai plants, soil and agricultural materials. Of particular importance is knowledge rarely committed to paper – from preparing pigments to understanding which materials communities traditionally used and why.

Workshops, educational programmes and creative experiences allow her to pass those processes on to artists, students and communities rather than leave them confined to research. In doing so, Mew is giving old techniques new applications and local resources fresh creative relevance. Craft Colour sits at that meeting point between art and preservation, demonstrating that safeguarding a tradition need not mean freezing it in time.