WORKING REMOTE

Photographer JATENIPAT KETPRADIT, better known as JKboy, has won multiple international awards and had his work appear in dozens of international publications. Over the past 15 years, he's captured stunning images that document some of the most isolated communities in the world.

- BRUCE SCOTT

You could write a book about the exploits of 39-year-old Jatenipat Ketpradit, a Bangkok-born-and-raised professional photographer who specialises in painstakingly precise portraits of obscure traditional communities living in some of the most remote corners of the globe. Luckily, you don't have to, as Jatenipat - who goes by the nickname JKboy - has already done it for you. Last October, he published a hardcover 320-page collection of photos titled People and Their World, which is available for purchase via his website jatenipatketpradit.com.

The book contains hundreds of arrestingly beautiful photographs which chronicle JK's journeys to visit such far-flung ethnic groups as the eagle hunters of outer Mongolia, the Karo people of southern Ethiopia, and the rainforest dwelling Mentawai, one of the oldest tribes in Indonesia. In the spring of 2022, he exhibited many of these images as part of a solo photography show at River City Bangkok, and last December, he wrapped up his second solo show at RCB, entitled People and Their World: Tsam - The Dance of Gods.

His 2023 show concentrated exclusively on a sacred and secretive Mongolian ritual of venerating ancient deities through masked dances. To document this unique Buddhist ceremony, JK made two self-financed trips to the centuries-old Amarbayasgalant Monastery; the first time alone, and the second time with his wife and a videographer in tow. Interestingly, these most recent trips were JK's seventh and eighth times visiting Mongolia, as he has had a long-standing fascination with this famously foreboding central Asian nation.