Hail the phalanx of sharp tent-like protuberances thrusting into the sky like a cluster of agave leaves offering a sense of salvation to the world, at least regionally in Southeast Asia, a ritual of catharsis. Abdul Latiff Mohidin had stumbled upon, and re-created, an iconic monolith, what he called the “trunk root of tradition”. The art, Pago-Pago, is an ecosystem that so defines Southeast Asia, that Singapore chose Latiff Mohidin and Pago-Pago as the embodiment piece, instead of its own Singaporean, in the landmark inaugural exhibition at Paris’s famous Centre Pompidou from Feb 28 to May 28, 2018. Whether man-made or intruded with natural growth, it is “living energy” of a nebulous ethos, a great mythos celebrating the civilisation of place and region. His Pago-Pago also lapsed into his poetry, singing praises of the Mekong and the Nusantara, of his ancestral Minangkabau… as far as your mind’s eye can see. Frank Sullivan described it as “the shape of boats (especially the prows), agave leaves and other plant forms, birds and their wings, the rhythmic flow of buffalo horns, aspects of the lingam, the lines of eaves and arches, or the patterns and motifs in pagodas or temples…”. The word 'Bangkok' is inscribed on the lower right of the work. In Bangkok, Latiff Mohidin established sincere friendship with the great, legendary Thai artist Thawan Duchanee.