What's On

Fences. Makeshift enclosures. Dividing lines. These increasingly present indicators of change define much of Phnom Penh's topography today. Since the onset of heightened urban construction in 2009, Lim Sokchanlina became interested in the border-making practices of national development schemes that promise a better "New Phnom Penh". Repeat visits to especially contentious sites provoked his questioning not only the physical borders but also their psychological ability to divide public and private, past and future, known and unknown.

With both archival and artistic impulse, Lim photographs these temporary partitions. Carefully composed under the brightness of midday sunlight, his corrugated color fields flatten the imposing fences into mundane facades. Colors, patterns, dents, rust, dirt, and markings invite a painterly inspection, while titles serve to keep a record of what was where when. The ghost of a landmark colonial building is remembered in Former Ministry of Tourism, Sothearos Boulevard and Sisowath Quay, 2009. Cambodia's iconic Corbusier-trained architect Vann Molyvann's work is mourned in Former Preah Suramarit National Theatre, National Assembly Street, 2009. Communities of displaced people are honored in Former Borei Keila, South Wall, Czechoslavakia Boulevard, between Street 152 and Street 164, 2012

Lim's solo exhibition Wrapped Future, based on his photographic series under the same name, is a bold and minimalist installation of real and representational borders. A commanding corrugated metal fence blocks access to the majority of the large gallery space, forcing the urban panorama onto the visitor. In the smaller space one relatively quiet photograph of a fence hangs and a new book of the photographic series can also be paged through. Here, isolated to the image, away from their bustling surroundings and ephemeral fate, the fences become permanent, recorded landmarks. As such, what they conceal, and ultimately what they will reveal, can be called into question.

About the Artist

Lim Sokchanlina (born Prey Veng, 1987) works across documentary and conceptual practices with photography, installation and performance. Using different strategies, he calls attention to a variety of social, cultural, economic and environmental changes in Cambodia resulting from globalization. He is a founding and active member of the artist collective Stiev Selepak / Art Rebels. Lim has exhibited widely in Cambodia, including at the National Museum and solo show My Motorbike and Me (PhotoPhnomPenh, 2009). Group exhibitions in 2012 include Rupture and Revival: Cambodian Photography in the Last Decade, Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore; Between Fantasy and Reality, Contact Photo Festival, The East Gallery, Toronto; Riverscapes IN FLUX, a regional exhibition in Hanoi, Ho Chi Min City, Manilla, Phnom Penh, Bangkok, Jakarta.

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About SA SA BASSAC

SA SA BASSAC is a gallery and resource center dedicated to creating, facilitating, producing, and sharing contemporary visual culture in and from Cambodia.