BANGKOK, THAILAND — The idea for the Thai Art Archives grew out of a conversation Gregory Galligan had with two art professors from Bangkok’s Silpakorn University back in 2007. They told Mr. Galligan — at the time a New York-based art critic and curator — that the country lacked a proper modern and contemporary art archive.

Their example was Montien Boonma, an internationally respected Thai artist who was 47 years old when he died of cancer in 2000. His sketchbooks, photographs and library were still being kept in the family home, looked after by his son but not organized. Read more