Posts Tagged ‘Khmer Arts Academy’

Rise of a New Empire

April 6th, 2010

Last Saturday, April 3rd, marked the 26th Annual Cambodian Student Society Culture Show. For those of you who aren’t familiar with either the Cambodian Student Society (CSS) or their Culture Show; the Culture Show is an annual show hosted by the members of CSS at Cal State Long Beach to showcase and preserve the Cambodian [...]
 

Last Saturday, April 3rd, marked the 26th Annual Cambodian Student Society Culture Show. For those of you who aren’t familiar with either the Cambodian Student Society (CSS) or their Culture Show; the Culture Show is an annual show hosted by the members of CSS at Cal State Long Beach to showcase and preserve the Cambodian culture and customs within the student body at Cal State Long Beach. For more information about CSS and their mission you can visit their website here.

Oh and before you go, be sure to visit my gallery here for the rest of the photos from the Culture Show!





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A Dirt Lot + A Cambodian Exile + Cain and Abel = “Expulsion”

March 23rd, 2010

A family torn apart by war only to be reunited in a far away land. A brother’s jealously leads to the death of another. A dirt lot in the City of Long Beach plus the creative minds of the Collage Dance Theatre and Khmer Arts Academy equals modern day story of those two tales: Expulsion. [...]
 

A family torn apart by war only to be reunited in a far away land. A brother’s jealously leads to the death of another. A dirt lot in the City of Long Beach plus the creative minds of the Collage Dance Theatre and Khmer Arts Academy equals modern day story of those two tales: Expulsion.


















And if you’d like to see the rest of the photos from Expulsion, you can find them here!

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Expulsion

March 15th, 2010

So what’s there to do on a Sunday afternoon in a vacant dirt lot on a nondescript corner of Long Beach? Plenty if you’re one of the Collage Dance Theatre or Khmer Arts Academy dancers practicing for an upcoming performance. About two months ago Heidi Duckler of the Collage Dance Theatre approached the dancers of [...]
 

So what’s there to do on a Sunday afternoon in a vacant dirt lot on a nondescript corner of Long Beach? Plenty if you’re one of the Collage Dance Theatre or Khmer Arts Academy dancers practicing for an upcoming performance. About two months ago Heidi Duckler of the Collage Dance Theatre approached the dancers of Khmer Arts Academy with an offer to collaborate on something new and different for The Arts Council for Long Beach’s A LOT series. The product of that collaboration is Expulsion.  Which is, as quoted from the Collage Dance Theatre’s website:

“Expulsion”, a new work from Heidi Duckler and Collage Dance Theatre will activate a vacant lot in Cambodia Town. Based on the themes of immigration and displacement, this cross-disciplinary site performance will explore the temporary, often fragile nature of “home.”

So I don’t want to spoil it for you but it’s definitely going to be something new and different if you’re expecting a traditional performance from KAA. Part of the collaboration between the Collage Dance Theatre and KAA was meant to push both groups to their creative boundaries as both groups had to be able to adapt to and create a new performance to fit not only fit the theme of Expulsion, but location and setting as well. So while you’ll probably recognize a lot of what’s taken from traditional Classical Cambodian Dance, this performance features new choreography that was created exclusively for Expulsion. I should also say that the new dance combined with the acrobatic performance of the Collage Dance Theatre should definitely keep you entertained. But that’s enough for me, on to the photos!

Anyways I hope you enjoyed that little sneak peak. If you want to see the rest of the performance in full you’ll have to show up to that nondescript vacant dirt lot on either March 19th or March 20th at 6 pm. For more information about Expulsion or the Collage Dance Theatre you can visit their site here or just take a look below.

Date: March 19th and 20th, 2011.
Time: 6:00 pm.
Location: 1546 E. Anaheim Street, Long Beach, CA 90813. At the intersection of Anaheim and Walnut across from Mark Twain Library.

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A Tale of the Monkey and the Mermaid

December 14th, 2009

Hanuman and Sovann Macha (The Monkey And The Mermaid) “The monkey general Hanuman was a very close aid of the Prince. When the Prince’s lovely wife Sita was kidnapped and taken prisoner, the Prince asked Hanuman to help him rescue her. Hanuman didn’t hesitate. He called the monkey army together and devised a plan. First [...]
 



Hanuman and Sovann Macha (The Monkey And The Mermaid)

“The monkey general Hanuman was a very close aid of the Prince. When the Prince’s lovely wife Sita was kidnapped and taken prisoner, the Prince asked Hanuman to help him rescue her. Hanuman didn’t hesitate. He called the monkey army together and devised a plan. First they would construct a bridge across the ocean. Then they would cross waters to the land where the Princess was being held, fight off her captors, and bring her safely home. One-by-one, the monkeys started lifting heavy boulders, and placing them on the sea. They would heave one huge stone after the other, and put them all down close together to form a causeway. But, as they were working, they noticed something strange. After struggling to move a big stone into place, the monkeys turned around to get another boulder. When they returned with the next stone, the one they had just left had disappeared. This happened again and again, until, finally, they went to inform Hanuman, their leader.”

-As retold by Toni Shapiro from The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies Website

So if you’ll recall from my last entry, the Art’s Council of Long Beach asked The Coral Youth Institute to produce a commercial for use as a promotional tool for The Khmer Arts Academy in Long Beach, CA to encourage the Cambodian Youth of Long Beach to learn more about their culture. The first part of the shoot covered the story of Moni Mekhala and Ream Eyso, which was the subject of my previous entry here. The second part of the shoot was a simple taped interview session of several of the students in full costume. And once again, since getting the kids dressed up for the shoot was a major undertaking, several of the parents from KAA wanted me to capture some portraits of the kids once the commercial filming was done. So here’s a few shots from the shoot. Enjoy!


Btw, if you would like to find out how the story of Hanuman and Sovann Macha ends, you can visit The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies Website here for another rendition retold by Toni Shapiro.

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