The first thing one notices about Jeff Perigois’ photographs of Boeung Kak Lake is the sense of absence. His images of the area in northern Phnom Penh—once the location of the city’s biggest body of water and now home to its biggest vacant lot—have an almost post-apocalyptic feel to them. The dramatic, mostly black-and-white photos of the transformed urban landscape, often cowering under roiling clouds, will be on display at his one-man show, Boeung Kak Was a Lake, at Meta House starting June 2.
The controversy surrounding Boeung Kak is well known to many. In 2008, contractors began pumping sand into the lake in preparation for a large-scale development project that will result in the construction of commercial and residential properties where once there was water. But critics from the outset have worried about the environmental and social costs of the project. Many homes and businesses have been displaced and the efforts of some families to resist mandatory relocation have met with official force. Just last week, 13 women were given jail terms for protesting the demolition of the homes of one-time residents.
“This kind of thing is happening everywhere,” said Perigois, who took his photos at Boeung Kak in April 2011 and then again in April this year. “Things must change, and we need development so that people do not remain poor, but should we really be doing it this way?”
For him, the lake’s filling is another instance of the natural environment being replaced by concrete and he wanted to document how it has affected the people who live there. He didn’t set out to make grand gestures, and the people in his images are engaged in everyday activities—a woman selling coffee, a boy pushing his motorbike. But they are surrounded by a world that has been torn asunder by powerful financial interests over which they have no control.
Still, some of his photos do have something of the grandiose about them. While in this instance the natural world has been uprooted by man, in Perigois’ images, nature still dominates. Even the skyscrapers of Phnom Penh’s quickly changing skyline seem lost in the landscape. “No matter how much we build, we are still small compared to nature,” he said.
Perigois, 42, hails from Brittany in western France. Two decades ago he met an older photographer he wanted to learn from. The man told Perigois to take his camera out to the streets and present the world from his own perspective. He later learned the man had been a student of Robert Doisneau, one of France’s most renowned photographers, and the advice he had been given was golden.
Perigois first started coming to Asia 14 years ago and has made Cambodia his base for the last five. He has always been attracted to the country’s natural landscape and its people, which is why he was drawn to the lake and its residents, and to this dramatic transformation. “I am just a witness to this, what we are doing to the world.”
WHO: Jeff Perigois
WHAT: Boeung Kak Was a Lake, photography exhibition
WHERE: Meta House, #37 Sothearos Blvd
WHEN: June 2
WHY: See what happens when a lake disappears