Personal readingson fragmentation
Much of what is known as “Cambodian art” are fragments of figurative sculptures intended for spiritual, social and political functions in their ancient temple origins. Stone incarnations of Hindu, Buddhist and mythological gods, kings, warriors, vehicles, guardians, creators and destroyers were originally integral to the architecture of both public and private spaces of ancient Khmer cities. Since the French Protectorate in the mid-1800s, and especially during the conflicts between the 1970s and ’90s, thousands of pre-Angkorean and Angkorean-era stone sculptures have been looted, trafficked, traded, gifted, sold, purchased and acquired—reincarnated in the cyclic market sphere of both public and private art collections worldwide.
Beheaded. Amputated. Bodiless. Limbless. In most collections, such fragments are presented as if whole, as aestheticized objects partnered with texts noting iconographic, stylistic and…