This past weekend I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York to visit the Sopheap Pich exhibit there. The exhibit was mostly empty compared to the more popular "Impressionism, Fashion, and Modernity," which although was excellently well done, deserves the same attention as Pich (I guess that's non-Western art's popularity for you). The exhibit is part of the "Season of Cambodia" exhibit in New York that showcases visual and performing arts from Cambodia in New York City. The festival is sponsored by Arn Chorn-Pond and his organization Cambodian Living Arts (formerly called The Cambodian Masters Performers Program) as well as New York art institutions in general (for example, the Met and the MoMa).
What I find most intriguing is that Chorn-Pond is Cambodian but also American, similar with Pich. These artists are Cambodian but have opportunities given to them by being American citizens as well. Being American has provided them, oftentimes, with the financial means to become full-time artists. Moreover, perhaps maintaing the victimhood of the Khmer Rouge opens up more doors and possibilities for art exhibits. It is in their best interest to maintain victimhood regardless of Chorn-Pond claiming that he wants to make Cambodia not "known for [the] killing fields or political conflicts." Although I do not want to think cynically about Cambodia's amazing and burgeoning contemporary arts scene, I cannot help but wonder about this potential and likely "victimhood" concept.
Born in 1971, Sopheap Pich grew up in Battambang before moving to the United States in 1984 after the Khmer Rouge genocide in 1984. He went to University of Massachusetts Amherst and mostly painted before switching to sculpture in 2004. The vast majority of his sculptures are very large and are made with bamboo and rattan (type of palm) secured with wire. He takes inspiration from "human anatomy and nature,""free circulation," and overall the "shapes in [the] environment."
The first piece in room 209 at the Met is called "Cycle," built in 2011, depicting two stomach organs connected together to "invoke bonding or pairing." This sculpture for him invokes the "anonymity of organs, essential to life yet without identity and thus able to assume universality." This conjures up the idea that behind the face, everyone is the same, giving a symbol of anti-racism, anti-hate, etc. As a survivor of genocide, these emotions surely are very apparent in Pich's life and emotions. The abstract stomach shapes for Pich show an "[openness] to possibility."
The next piece was titled "Morning Glory" (2011) and was beautifully spread across the floor of the gallery. Unlike our morning glory flowers in the United States, Cambodian "morning glories" refer to an edible herb often also called "swamp cabbage." Morning glories, Pich describes in the sculpture's caption, were the second most important source of nourishment after rice during the Khmer Rouge. Pich describes his surprise that they are still popular in Cambodian cuisine as they are the "lowest on the culinary scale" in his mind (that being said, rice was and still is the most important grain in Cambodian society).
"Ratanakiri Valley Drip" (2012) was inspired from his sadness that northern Cambodia is now barren land--stripped of its timber and resources due to greed. When Ratanakiri Province was described to him, he writes in the caption, it was a land of lushness with local villages, but when Pich went to see the region for himself, he found all of this gone from the villagers desperation for financial income. This immediately relates to the (mostly illegal) deforestation still happening in Cambodia presently.
His piece "Upstream" (2005) depicted, on a larger and more grand scale, the fish traps that his father made during the Khmer Rouge to catch food (mainly frogs). The nets are supposed to elicit the idea of a border crossing or barrier (a reoccurring theme in the genocide with the Thai border holding refugee camps and the Vietnam border where U.S. soldiers dropped B-52s).
"Junk Nutrients," constructed in 2009, shows an intestine with trash collected from the Beng Kok River outside of his studio close to Phnom Penh, Cambodia's capital city. His intentions were to show pollution, both literally (from the trash) and metaphorically. He describes pollution of the mind through media and body from the numerous chemicals in food--likely hinting to distaste for the Asian Green Revolution. What I found most intriguing was Pich stating that he disliked the "numbing effect of tradition and culture" in the caption. I believe that most likely, Pich wants to break free from the common western attitude that Asian arts should be more "oriental-esque" à la Japanese calligraphy, for example, and not modern sculptures. Indeed, Pich himself is breaking free of the typical Angkor architecture associated with Cambodia. Regardless, Pich should realize (and likely does) that these "traditional" art forms are what Cambodia is still mostly known for and what makes the country internationally renowned and recognized.
What I find most intriguing is that Chorn-Pond is Cambodian but also American, similar with Pich. These artists are Cambodian but have opportunities given to them by being American citizens as well. Being American has provided them, oftentimes, with the financial means to become full-time artists. Moreover, perhaps maintaing the victimhood of the Khmer Rouge opens up more doors and possibilities for art exhibits. It is in their best interest to maintain victimhood regardless of Chorn-Pond claiming that he wants to make Cambodia not "known for [the] killing fields or political conflicts." Although I do not want to think cynically about Cambodia's amazing and burgeoning contemporary arts scene, I cannot help but wonder about this potential and likely "victimhood" concept.
Born in 1971, Sopheap Pich grew up in Battambang before moving to the United States in 1984 after the Khmer Rouge genocide in 1984. He went to University of Massachusetts Amherst and mostly painted before switching to sculpture in 2004. The vast majority of his sculptures are very large and are made with bamboo and rattan (type of palm) secured with wire. He takes inspiration from "human anatomy and nature,""free circulation," and overall the "shapes in [the] environment."
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| A slightly illegal picture of "Cycle." All of the photos in this post are taken by yours truly hiding from the Met guards. |
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| "Morning Glory" |
"Ratanakiri Valley Drip" (2012) was inspired from his sadness that northern Cambodia is now barren land--stripped of its timber and resources due to greed. When Ratanakiri Province was described to him, he writes in the caption, it was a land of lushness with local villages, but when Pich went to see the region for himself, he found all of this gone from the villagers desperation for financial income. This immediately relates to the (mostly illegal) deforestation still happening in Cambodia presently.
 |
| "Upstream" |
"Junk Nutrients," constructed in 2009, shows an intestine with trash collected from the Beng Kok River outside of his studio close to Phnom Penh, Cambodia's capital city. His intentions were to show pollution, both literally (from the trash) and metaphorically. He describes pollution of the mind through media and body from the numerous chemicals in food--likely hinting to distaste for the Asian Green Revolution. What I found most intriguing was Pich stating that he disliked the "numbing effect of tradition and culture" in the caption. I believe that most likely, Pich wants to break free from the common western attitude that Asian arts should be more "oriental-esque" à la Japanese calligraphy, for example, and not modern sculptures. Indeed, Pich himself is breaking free of the typical Angkor architecture associated with Cambodia. Regardless, Pich should realize (and likely does) that these "traditional" art forms are what Cambodia is still mostly known for and what makes the country internationally renowned and recognized.
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