On the occasion of the 70th anniversary of Cambodia’s independence, the French Embassy and the French Institute in Cambodia in partnership with the SOSORO Museum and the Institute for Research and Development (Institut de recherche pour le développement, IRD), are organising a series of events to celebrate the special ties that unite the two countries with exhibitions, conferences and a series of films.
According to a press release from Embassy of France in Phnom Penh, from Nov. 8, the exhibition “1953: France-Cambodia, a new beginning” will be on display at the SOSORO Museum. It retraces the history of Cambodia’s independence after the French protectorate, an independence obtained by King-Father Norodom Sihanouk “without shedding a drop of blood”, as well as the country’s development in the two decades that followed. Far from being a break with France, the exhibition shows that the years following the independence in 1953 were, on the contrary, marked by an intensification of bilateral cooperation until the early 1970s.
On the same day another exhibition will be inaugurated on the wall of the French Embassy, including “Cambodia from the air – 70 years of cooperation”. It has been designed by the IRD, on the basis of the work they carry out with leading Cambodian academic institutions. With aerial and satellite images taken over the last 70 years, the exhibition bears witness to the transformations of the Cambodian territory and offers a new perspective on the country’s evolution, while demonstrating how Earth observation techniques can help us to better meet the challenges of sustainable development.
From Nov. 8 to 11, the French Institute will be screening a selection of four films (in French) about the Cambodia and other countries of the former French Indochina’s independence. The screenings will take place in the presence of director Philippe Fréling, in residence in Phnom Penh.
Besides, a series of conferences will be organised at the French Institute with historian Marie Aberdam, teacher and researcher at the Institut National des Langues et des Civilisations (INALCO). On Dec. 5, the first conference will review the context, stakeholders and steps that led the country to regain its autonomy, from the emergence of Khmer nationalism in the 1930s to the challenges of a full recovering of sovereignty in the aftermath of the Geneva Conference (1954), which put an end to the first Indochina war. The second conference, on Dec. 12, will explore the “Cambodian memories of colonization”, by looking at the narratives and representations of colonisation in Cambodia, and the relationship between history and memory in Cambodian society today. Both lectures will be given in French, with simultaneous translation into Khmer.
