Byline: Marina Shafik

What do jasmine flowers, a vampire movie, current affairs and a blindfold have in common? They are all tools belonging to Belle Sodhachivy Chumvan, Cambodian choreographer and dancer of international repute. She is one of the protagonists of La Rue Danse, organised by the French Institute: an outdoor dance spectacle that, on March 8, will burst into life on Koh Pich.

Twenty choreographers and dancers will perform to different kinds of music: expect everything from classical to hip hop to circus to rock. Visitors can roam between eight outdoor stages for a night in full motion. “There will be a general movement all around the garden, creating a very dynamic and fresh ambient,” says Olivier Planchon, deputy director of the Institute.

Belle, who will perform her own choreography, says inspiration can come at any moment. “Contemporary dance is very connected to our daily life,” Belle says. “I can be inspired by news, by a passer-by or by a detail of a movie. For example, I remember taking inspiration from the smoothed movement of an axe, manipulated by a character before killing a vampire.”

A graduate of the Royal University of Fine Arts, Belle’s beginnings were in classical dance but her creations represent several styles wrapped up in a very personal and innovative way. “It’s a continuous research and experimentation,” she says. “Usually, my performances are based on two themes: one is connected to Cambodian contemporary background and the other is about my personal feelings.”

The choreographer, who will also perform at the prestigious Opera de Paris next spring, is swift to point out that in order to be a good dancer you have to be also an actress, getting into the part and communicating feelings. Belle’s mother, who is her greatest fan but also her harshest critic, taught her something she would never forget. “At the beginning, I thought that dance was all about movement and technique but she is the one who told me: ‘Belle, if you dance only with your body you look like a puppet. You need to have feelings which guide your movements. Everything starts from here…’” Belle says, motioning to her heart.

And while concentration may be the most important thing to achieve before stepping on stage, Belle says she never performs without her special propitiatory ritual. “As dancers, we usually buy three different kinds of fruit, jasmines and candles as offerings before a show. When we perform we can feel the protective presence of the spirit on top of us. I know that there is no better master than us to feel confident on stage, but it’s good to have an extra assurance.”

Indeed it is. After all, dance is a very physical art form – and can, on occasion, prove dangerous. Pointing to a scar on her lip, the result of a performance in which she was blindfolded, Belle laughs, recalling having to return to the stage with a black eye: “I remember my boss saying: ‘Oh god, she looks like a boxing dancer!”

WHO: Belle Sodhachivy Chumvan et al
WHAT: La Rue Danse performance
WHERE: Koh Pich (Diamond Island)
WHEN: 7pm March 8
WHY: “Dance, when you’re broken open. Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you’re perfectly free” – Rumi

 

In the year 450BC, Confucius conveyed a message that, thousands of years later, is still astonishingly valid: “Tell me and I’ll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I’ll understand.” Performance: this is one of the new artistic trends gaining ground in Cambodia. Until March 21, involve yourself in 17 performance videos by 10 Cambodian artists in Phnom Penh: Rescue Archaeology, The Body and the Lens in the City.

Says Curator Erin Gleeson: “Video art here is actually a way to share and document a performance. The artists of this exhibition are very different, but they all act like rescue archaeologists: namely, someone who reacts urgently yet carefully to a transitional moment in which there is a threat of irrevocable loss, aside from archaeologists’ efforts to document. During a critical time of rapid urban, social, economic and cultural change and continuity in Phnom Penh, Cambodian artists are working with a sense of urgency in response to the fluctuating urban present.”

Continuity, change, loss and destruction are the main themes. Many draw attention to Boeung Kak’s recent history and the filling of the lake in the wake of mass forced evictions. Leang Seckon, personally touched by the event, choreographed a poetic performance shortly before being evicted from his own home in 2010. In the video, a group of men on a boat are trying to save a symbolic fish. When they discover it’s already dead they perform a funeral ritual: dressing themselves, the fish and the soon-to-be-demolished home in white. As the sun goes down, they hold a touching cremation ceremony atop the sand.

Another interesting yet tragicomic performance is Khvay Samnang’s Newspaper Man. Here, the artist – swathed in Khmer newspapers – walks blindly where the waters of the lake once lapped, tripping over the remnants of long-toppled houses. “Since the local press ignored news about the lake, I used my body to write about it,” he says. Questioned by puzzled police once, he replied: “I am selling newspapers. Business people always think ahead. You are developing this place and I am here first.”

Then there’s Svay Sareth and his sculpture, Mon Boulet (‘My Ball Enchained’). The artist drags this huge, heavy metal sphere from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh over a regenerative five days’ of travelling 250km. “His work, it’s really about catharsis,” says Gleeson of this modern-day Sisyphus who believes that if only Cambodians could demonstrate more openly the ‘weight’ of their past traumas, they would be able to move forward.

WHO: Aspiring urban archaeologists
WHAT: Phnom Penh: Rescue Archaeology exhibition, screening and book launch
WHERE: Sa Sa Bassac Gallery, #18 (second floor) Sothearos Blvd.
WHEN: 6pm February 28 (screening), March 15 (book launch) and March 21 (screening)
WHY: We built this city

 

Her face is furrowed by crossroads of deep wrinkles; she chews tobacco, has an impenetrable expression and sports a krama atop her head. Who is she? Cambodia – or perhaps what the country might look like if it had a face.

Sometimes our mood can be interpreted through our facial expressions: an open smile, a scream of terror or anguish, a laugh, a nose wrinkled in disgust, tearful eyes. Other times, almost imperceptible facial movements are like mysterious shadows, forming and vanishing in the blink of an eye. Such fluid feelings can be difficult to decode, with only the most attentive of eyes able to capture them on canvas. This is the job of Sao Sovannara: hunter of human emotions.

His portraits comprise photography imbued with secrecy. One, depicting an elderly woman representing the Kingdom of Cambodia, became the manifesto of Cambodian Portraits, a new exhibition at The Insider Gallery. The collection includes 15 profound and intimate artworks, including paintings and sculptures.

“When I started this artwork I thought about my granny,” says Sao. “She used to always have tobacco in her mouth and wear a krama to wrap her hair up. These are very typical Cambodian traditions. She died recently but her memory is always very strong.” The young artist, who used to draw in night markets to finance his art and architectural studies, is one of the winners of the second Cambodian Fine Arts Contest, celebrated last year at the Royal University of Fine Arts. His subject, says Sao, is a woman who, like many other grandmothers, endured great hardship to keep her family alive, but despite everything still wears a smile. She is, above all, symbolic of Cambodia’s endurance and strong will.

There’s a certain feeling captured inside any portrait: it takes time to create one and even longer to interpret the person behind the easel, waiting for something more than a photograph, deeper than a mirror. Art, psychology, sensitivity and concentration are the main tools for someone like Sao. “Being able to reproduce wrinkles, the signs left by a life of contrasting emotions, has been the hardest thing for me,” he says, pointing out how art can remind people of something long lost. “My generation is very different from the previous ones. We should listen more to our ancestors, study more about the history of Cambodia and, above all, not throw our traditions away. We should never forget where we come from because this is our strength.”

WHO: Sao Sovannara
WHAT: Cambodian Portraits art exhibition
WHERE: The Insider Gallery, Intercontinental Hotel, Mao Tse Tung Blvd.
WHEN: Until March 10
WHY: “We should never forget where we come from because this is our strength.” – Sao Sovannara

 

It sounds surreal but there are two people in Cambodia who speak dragon. They came all the way from Germany to do this and they are Ernst Altmann, an artist from Berlin, and his filmmaker wife Bjela Proßowsky. It all started in their kitchen, which is probably where all the best ideas originate: the idea of going back to Southeast Asia, the land which stole Bjela’s heart when she was a young traveller, to create a comparative artistic project with Cambodians. And so How To Talk To Dragons was born.

With the help of fire-breathing winged things, shadow puppets and a video camera, the artists set out to discover similarities between the Old Continent and Asia – and uncovered a few peculiarities along the way. A test performance of their shadow play JMOM takes place at Meta House on February 8, followed by a bigger event in March involving musicians and other performers. “Ours is a growing exhibition,” Bjela explains. “We want to bring our show around local villages and get people to create and play with us. The work-in-progress itself is the project, which I am filming in all its fascinating process.”

Ernst and Bjela are now combing Phnom Penh, hunting for oil lamps, local tailors to make a special tent, ancient Cambodian myths and examples of the dragon tradition in folk art. At public shadow puppet plays, they have been thrilled by the enthusiasm of Cambodian children, who play with the silhouettes on Ernst’s t-shirt. “Shadows are magic,” says Ernst. “Videos and films are fast and they suck you in, but the time frame of this art is slow. While playing and cutting them, I go back to childhood, losing myself in the moment. Through this project we want to gain back time and encourage people to go slow again.”

The couple chose dragons as their theme because the creatures exist in every culture, connecting the whole of humankind. Moreover, legend has it that the lands of the Khmer originated from the Naga, a water dragon, something Cambodia’s sense of identity is still strongly connected to. While some youngsters scoff, dismissing winged fire-breathers as the stuff of childish fantasy, Ernst noticed they exhibit a certain shyness towards – almost a fear of – these fantastical beings, especially when talking about Neak Ta, a guardian spirit. Somehow, even under the surface, Cambodians still identify with it.

“The dragon is the symbol of power of nature,” says Ernst. “It’s the human connection to his natural state. Europeans killed this bond, but in Cambodia it’s different. It’s a moment to say: ‘Hey, don’t forget that this is your power. It’s great that you have it. Don’t lose it.’” In an era that is increasingly becoming a crazy rush against everything – time, nature, ourselves – perhaps we should pause for a moment and pay heed to our ancestors. We might even rediscover how to speak dragon.

 

WHO: Artist Ernst Altmann and filmmaker Bjela Proßowsky

WHAT: How To Talk To Dragons exhibition and JMOM shadow play performance

WHERE: Meta House, #37 Sothearos Blvd.

WHEN: 7pm February 8

WHY: “I believe in everything until it’s disproved. So I believe in fairies, the myths, dragons. It all exists, even if it’s in your mind. Who’s to say that dreams and nightmares aren’t as real as the here and now?” – John Lennon