2024.10.12 － 11.16
The water element: Tonlé Sap Lake is floating
nca | nichido contemporary art will be presenting a permanent exhibition from September 27 (Fri.) to October 5 (Sat.).
Venue: nca | nichido contemporary art
Date: 10/12 (Sat.) ~ 11/16 (Sat.), 2024
Gallery hours: Tue. – Sat. / 11:00 – 19:00 （Closed on Mon., Sun., and National Holiday）
Opening talk: 10/12 (Sat.) 17:00 ～ 18:30
Featuring: Lim Sokchanlina x Daisuke Miyatsu (Art Collector/ University Professor)
*Language: Japanese and English
Opening reception: 10/12 (Sat.) 18:30 ～ 19:30
nca | nichido contemporary art is pleased to present Cambodian artist Lim Sokchanlina’s new solo show The Water Element: Tonlé Sap is floating.
Through his diverse artistic practice - spanning photography, video art and performance – Lim explores the changes happening in today’s Cambodia, whether from a political, economic, environmental, or cultural perspective, taking a look at the issues this entails. Water Element: Tonlé Sap is floating is one of Lim’s recent projects that focus on the climate change crisis, and consists of a new body of works realized through on-site research and temporary co-inhabiting with the local community of the Kompong Phluk floating village, built within the floodplain of the Tonlé Sap, about 35 km from Siem Reap, which Lim has been visiting every year since 2011. The exhibition features thirteen photos, one video installation and one photo-slide projection.
Lim Sokchanlina obtained his degree in Economy from Cambodia’s Norton University in 2010. It is during his university years that he became a self-taught artist and, as such, he has been active ever since, currently based in Phnom Penh.
Lim started to gain attention from 2007 participating in group shows and events held at the few local art spaces available at that time, such as Java Café & Gallery and Sa Sa Art Gallery (eventually renamed SA SA Art Projects and now permanently closed).
On the occasion of his first solo show in Japan, hosted by nca | nichido contemporary art in 2019, Lim presented WRAPPED FUTURE II (2019), a body of work where fences made for construction sites were shown erected in the middle of desolated areas – a lotus pond, for instance – as symbols of the fast-pacing urban development and industrialization of Cambodia, a country whose wounds left by the civil war and the coup, followed by the rise of the Khmer Rouge regime, are still fresh.
Used to limit construction sites, the fences (which had been previously featured in Lim’s 2009~2012’s series WRAPPED FUTURE to address Phnom Penh’s construction industry) have a twofold purpose here as, on one hand, they represent that line that separates the past from the future, on the other, they conceal anger and despair, nurturing the illusion that some hopeful event is momentarily happening within their perimeters.
Again, at the Singapore Biennale in 2019, Lim presented the video work Letter to the Sea (2019/ shown at nca | nichido contemporary art in 2022 during the special screening project Storytellers -Through the lens of contemporaneity Vol.1) where the artist is filmed, fully submerged, while reading a poem he wrote addressing the young men who were forced into illegal work in Thailand’s waters for about three years, deceived by unscrupulous brokers.
In addition, through his participation to major, international art events, such as Documenta 15 in 2022, Lim has broadened his artistic presence stepping up on the global stage.
Cambodia has been historically referred to as “the water kingdom”, and national holidays such as the Water Festival (celebrated in November), when Cambodians show gratitude and respect for the gift of water engaging in boat racing on traditional rowboats, or the New Year Water Festival (held during New Year’s celebrations) when they pray for prosperity, are widely known.
Tonlé Sap, the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia, pulses through the suburbs of Siem Reap, flowing upstream for approximately 120 km, from the Mekong river to the heart of the country.
Famous for the temporal changes of its water area, it can expand more than three times its dry-season size during the wet months (from June to November), which are associated with an increasing volume of water, extending over 16,000 sq km, an area four-times that of Lake Biwa. The lake nurtures the extremely rich ecosystem as Cambodia’s heart, functioning, so to speak, as some sort of natural pomp that receives water from the Mekong River during the flood season before pushing it back during the low-flow season. It is home to over than 200 fresh-water fish species among the 1,200 that inhabit the Mekong river basin.
Furthermore, it is a well-known fact that the fish catch involving Tonlé Sap’s water system accounts for around half of the total catches of Cambodia's inland fishery (occurring in rivers, lakes and wetlands), providing for the 60% of protein intake of the entire population.
However, recent years have witnessed the occurrence of unusual phenomena which cannot be simply dismissed as manifestations of the majesty of nature.
Wet-season water levels have dropped compared to previous years and the deteriorating water quality has been heavily affecting the livelihood of local communities, their access to clean water and, consequently, their health.
Furthermore, some large fish species, such as the Mekong giant barb (the largest carp species in the world and Cambodia’s national fish) and the Mekong giant catfish have entirely disappeared, with fish catch showing a downward trend.
It goes without saying that the global climate change and its ramifications - global warming to name one - represents the leading cause. Other factors, such as the presence of dams built as part of the large-scale development push and capital inflow from China with its “one belt one road” initiative, deforestation and mining operations have been significantly contributing to environmental degradation. And we cannot overlook the spreading of illegal fishing that, prioritizing economic growth, relies on harmful practices which include pumping, the use of motor boats, chemical substances and electric shock devices.
For more than 10 years, Lim, who has always greatly empathized with such issues, has been visiting and interviewing families living in the floating village of Kampong Phluk, whose livelihood heavily depends on fishing.
The new body of work presented on the occasion of Lim’s solo show The water element: Tonlé Sap Lake is floating at nca, focuses on the everyday life of people whose livelihood is based on the lake and whose survival is now at stake, including as well all the different species inhabiting Tonlé Sap, its floodplain and flooded forest.
There is a growing sense of injustice among developing countries towards the actions taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by developed countries, who, after the industrial revolution, enjoyed the benefits of industrialization discharging all the while, and over the course of many years, harmful substances such as methane and carbon dioxide in large amounts (yet, both China, the world's largest greenhouse gas emitter, and the U.S., second in line, have not taken any joint aggressive measures to end fossil fuels).
In addition, the urge for Chinese capital to boost the forestry sector, the mineral industry and the development of core infrastructure, starting, for instance, from the construction of 5 dams on Tonlé Sap, could be seen as a threat to Cambodia’s economic security. While calls for decolonization have been growing louder, what is happening around Tonlé Sap lake can be seen as a series of anachronistic actions which are setting Cambodia’s clock back in time.
Lim’s new body of work on view in this solo show, bringing to the fore the dramatic situation of Tonlé Sap lake, together with his other work, Letter to The Sea, a requiem dedicated to the victims of modern slavery, deceived fishermen, forced to work in the ocean, whose rights were violated, draw a portrait that captures the complicated, layered reality of 21st century’s Cambodia: “The Water Kingdom”, which finds itself at the mercy of powerful countries, each pushing their own political agenda.
The surface of water from the actual Tonlé Sap lake, used here as a screen to project the video work Flow like water, forms into ripples caused by oscillations and small changes happening inside the surrounding environment, reflecting images that change depending on the viewing angle.
Yet, what it is actually showing is how questions, such as “national benefits”, “public opinion”, or “interests” do not carry a universal meaning and how extremely fickle they truly are.
At the same time Lim is positively welcoming change by allowing the audience to interact with the water bucket, or, yet, its contents, simultaneously breaking the taboo of art as something physically untouchable.
And that, going beyond the framework of a simple audience-artwork interaction, seems to be voicing an urgent call to people to stand their ground as crew of Spaceship Earth.
Text by Daisuke Miyatsu (Art Collector / University Professor)
Lim Sokchanlina
b. 1987, Prey Veng, Cambodia. Currently lives in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
2010 BA Department of Economics Norton University, Cambodia
Main solo shows: ”Wrapped Future II”, nca | nichido contemporary art, Tokyo (2019) / “National Road Number 5”, Art Stage Singapore (2016) / “Urban Street Nightclub”, Art Stage Singapore (2014) / “Urban Street Night Club”, SA SA BASSAC, Phnom Penh (2013) / “Wrapped Future”-Triangle Park (BAM), New York (2013).
Main group shows: ”Zomi - Trans-local Migrants on the Water” Kinan Art Week, Wakayama (2024) / "Archipelago: Paradise Revisit" The 9th Jimei x Arles International Photo Festival, Three Shadows Xiamen Photography Art Centre, China (2024) / “River Pulses, Border Flows”, Guangdong Times Museum, China (2022) / “EMOTIONAL ASIA - Miyatsu Daisuke Collection x Fukuoka Asian Art Museum / Fukuoka Asian Art Museum (2022) / “Maja Tuk Maja Day (Master of Territory)”, Documenta 15, Kassel/Germany (2022) / "Space In Between", Chankiri House complex, Phnom Penh, Cambodia (2022) / "In Between", nca | nichido contemporary art, Tokyo (2022) / "Maja Tuk Maja Day (Master of Territory)", Sa Sa Art Projects, Phnom Penh, Cambodia (2022) / "Phnom Penh 2043 – Asian Art Biennale" National Museum of Fine Art, Taiwan (2021) / "My Home? Identity XVI - curated by Kenichi Kondo" nca | nichido contemporary art, Tokyo (2021) / Singapore Biennale (2019) / “Sun shower: Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia 1980s to Now” Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan (2019) / “Count the waves” Chinretsukan Gallery, Tokyo University of the Arts, Tokyo (2019) / “National Road Number 5”, Bangkok Biennale (2018) / “Wrapped Future II”, Photo Phnom Penh Festival, Phnom Penh, Cambodia (2018) / “Sa Art Project”, Sidney Biennale, Sidney, Australia (2018) / “Sunshower: Contemporary Art from Southeast Asia 1980s to Now”, Mori Museum, Fukuoka Asian Art Museum (2017) / “Histories of the Future”, National Museum Of Phnom Penh, Phnom Penh, Cambodia (2016).