Category: Entertainment

entertainment news

‘Kung Fu Panda 4’ No. 1 at Box Office for Second Week

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It’s March Madness, More People Can Legally Bet on Basketball Games

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Usher, Fantasia Barrino, ‘Color Purple’ Honored at 55th NAACP Image Awards

LOS ANGELES — Usher was named entertainer of the year at the 55th annual NAACP Awards on Saturday night, which highlighted works by entertainers and writers of color.

After Usher accepted his award at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, the superstar R&B singer spoke about being thankful about the journey of his successful career that has lasted three decades.

He reeled off several of his recent big moments including his sold-out residency in Las Vegas, getting married, releasing his ninth studio album “Coming Home” and his Super Bowl halftime performance, which became the most-watched in the game’s history.

Usher beat out Colman Domingo, Fantasia Barrino, Halle Bailey and Keke Palmer.

“I don’t know how many people do that much stuff in one setting,” said the multi-Grammy winner, who was presented the award by Oprah Winfrey. After being surprised by Winfrey’s presence, he thanked those who have supported him throughout the years.

“This is for you, you, my number ones,” the singer said as the audience repeated his words back to him. The final words of his speech were recited lyrics from his popular song “Superstar” from his 2024 album “Confessions,” which has sold more than 10 million units in the U.S.

Earlier in the ceremony, Usher was honored with the President’s Award for the singer’s public service achievements through his New Look Foundation. He thanked the strong women in his life, including his mother and wife Jenn Goicoechea, whom he married after his Super Bowl halftime performance last month.

“The say behind or beside or with every strong man is a stronger woman,” he said.

Queen Latifah hosted the awards ceremony aired live on BET.

“The Color Purple” was awarded best motion picture. The musical film featured star-studded cast including Barrino, Taraji P. Henson, Domingo, H.E.R., Danielle Brooks, Corey Hawkins and Bailey.

Barrino, who starred as Celie in the film, won for best actress in a motion picture.

“I didn’t prepare a speech, because I didn’t think I was going to win,” the singer-actor said. “I was afraid to play Celie, but I’m glad I did. Because I kept saying ‘If I don’t win an award, the awards that I will win will come from the people who watched ‘Color Purple’ and the women who will relate to her and feel like Oscars when they walk out.’”

New Edition was inducted into the NAACP Image Awards Hall of Fame. The induction is bestowed on individuals who are viewed as pioneers in their respective fields and whose influence shaped their profession.

“We stand here in brotherhood,” said Michael Bivins while his group members behind him. The Grammy-nominated group includes Bobby Brown, Johnny Gill, Ralph Tresvant, Ronnie DeVoe and Ricky Bell.

“You’ve seen our story. You know what we’ve been through,” said Bivins, who spoke about the group overcoming conflict and tension in their earlier years to now holding a residency in Las Vegas.

“But we call each other every day,” he continued. “We text each other every day. We check on our families. You watched us grow up. We’re still growing.”

Damson Idris won best actor in a drama television series for his role in “Snowfall.” Henson and Domingo took home best supporting roles in “The Color Purple.” Domingo also won best actor in a motion picture for his role in “Rustin.”

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Russian-Belarusian Band Returns to Stage After Detention in Thailand

Warsaw, Poland — A Russian-Belarusian rock band that denounces Moscow’s Ukraine invasion returned to the stage this week, voicing defiance after being detained in Thailand in January and threatened with deportation to Russia. 

The band, Bi-2, formed in the 1980s in Belarus when it was part of the Soviet Union, left Russia in protest over the invasion and has been touring ever since in countries with large Russian-speaking communities. 

Ahead of a concert in Vilnius on Thursday, band members met with exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya and supporters of late Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny, who died in an Arctic prison last month. 

“We have become hostages to Russian history,” Egor Bortnik, one of the band’s two founders, told AFP ahead of a concert in Warsaw on Saturday. 

But 51-year-old Bortnik, who is better known by his stage name “Lyova,” said he was “not against the war.” 

“On the contrary, I’m for the war. I just want Ukraine to liberate its own territory,” he said. 

“Putin has to gather his orcs and get out of Ukraine,” Bortnik said, using a disparaging term for Russian soldiers frequently used by Ukrainians. 

The band was detained in Phuket, Thailand, in January on immigration charges in a case that has alarmed Russians critical of President Vladimir Putin living abroad. 

The organizers of their concerts said all the necessary permits had been obtained, but the band was issued with tourist visas in error, and they accused the Russian consulate of waging a campaign to cancel the concerts. 

After a week in detention, the band members were released and traveled to Israel, where they met with Foreign Minister Israel Katz who said in a statement that the episode showed that “music will win.” 

Several of their concerts in Russia were canceled in 2022 after they refused to play at a venue with banners supporting the war in Ukraine, after which they left the country. 

“I put my prosperity on the line when the war began, and I had to leave Russia. It was unexpected, it was not a process we had prepared for,” Bortnik said. 

Bortnik, who moved to Israel while still a teenager, said he was more used to emigration than some of his peers who left Russia in the wake of the war. 

“I understand how difficult it is,” he said. 

Bortnik said he was no “geopolitician” and does not write explicitly “political songs” although their lyrics can “hit a nerve that is constantly vibrating.” 

He said Putin’s demise could be sudden and violent and would also bring down Belarusian strongman Alexander Lukashenko, who has been in power for three decades. 

“If something happens to Putin then there could be a civil war — the finale for any tyranny,” he said. 

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‘Squid Game’ Star Found Guilty of Sexual Misconduct

Seoul — South Korea’s “Squid Game” actor O Yeong-su has been found guilty of sexual misconduct, a local court said Friday, after he was charged with assaulting a woman in 2017.

The 79-year-old in 2022 became the first South Korean to win a Golden Globe Award for best supporting actor in a series for his performance as a seemingly vulnerable old man in the mega-hit Netflix dystopian thriller.

The actor was sentenced to eight months in prison, suspended for two years, the Seongnam Branch of the Suwon District Court told AFP.

He has been also ordered to complete 40 hours of classes on sexual violence, the court added.

The victim’s own records of the assault and her claims are “consistent … and appear to be statements that cannot be made without actually experiencing them,” judge Jeong Yeon-ju said, according to the court.

O was indicted in 2022 without detention on charges of sexually assaulting a woman, who has not been identified, on two occasions.

The incidents took place when O was staying in a rural area for a theatre performance in 2017, on a walking path and in front of the victim’s residence, respectively, according to the Suwon District Court.

“Squid Game,” a series that depicts a dark world where marginalized individuals are forced to compete in deadly versions of traditional children’s games, quickly gained immense popularity on Netflix.

Within less than four weeks of its release in 2021, it attracted a staggering 111 million viewers.

The show’s success has amplified South Korea’s increasingly outsized influence on global popular culture, following global fame won by the likes of K-pop band BTS and the Oscar-winning film “Parasite.”

Multiple figures in South Korea’s film industry — including late filmmaker Kim Ki-duk and actor Cho Jae-hyun — have faced sexual assault allegations.

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Alec Baldwin Seeks Dismissal of Grand Jury Indictment in Fatal Shooting of Cinematographer

SANTA FE, N.M. — Defense attorneys for Alec Baldwin urged a New Mexico judge on Thursday to dismiss a grand jury indictment against the actor in the fatal shooting of a cinematographer on the set of the Western movie “Rust.”

The indictment in January charged Baldwin with involuntary manslaughter in the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins on Oct. 21, 2021, at a movie ranch on the outskirts of Santa Fe.

Baldwin has pleaded not guilty to the charge. His attorneys in a new court filing accused prosecutors of “unfairly stacking the deck” against Baldwin in grand jury proceedings that diverted attention away from exculpatory evidence and witnesses.

They say that prevented the jury from asserting their obligation to hear testimony from director Joel Souza, who was wounded in the shooting while standing near Hutchins, as well as assistant director and safety coordinator Dave Halls and props master Sarah Zachry.

“The grand jury did not receive the favorable or exculpatory testimony and documents that the state had an obligation to present,” said the court motion signed by defense attorney Luke Nikas. “Nor was the grand jury told it had a right to review and the obligation to request this information.”

Prosecutor Kari Morrissey declined to comment and said a response will be filed with the court.

Baldwin’s motion also asserts that the grand jury received inaccurate and one-sided testimony about the revolver involved in the fatal shooting.

“Rust” armorer Hannah Gutierrez-Reed was convicted by a jury last week in the shooting and is being held without bond pending an April sentencing hearing. Involuntary manslaughter carries a felony sentence of up to 18 months in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Baldwin was pointing a gun at cinematographer Halyna Hutchins when the revolver went off, killing Hutchins and injuring Souza. Baldwin has maintained that he pulled back the gun’s hammer, but not the trigger.

Prosecutors blamed Gutierrez-Reed at a two-week trial for unwittingly bringing live ammunition onto the set of “Rust” where it was expressly prohibited. They also said she failed to follow basic gun-safety protocols.

Halls last year pleaded no contest to negligent handling of a firearm and completed a sentence of six months of unsupervised probation.

Baldwin is scheduled for trial in July.

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Ukraine Oscar Winner Mstyslav Chernov Talks to VOA About His Film 

This month’s Academy Awards ceremony saw a big first for Ukraine as Mstyslav Chernov’s “20 Days in Mariupol” won the best documentary Oscar. The film is a first-person account of being in the eastern Ukrainian city during the first weeks of Russia’s invasion. Khrystyna Shevchenko talked with Chernov. Anna Rice has that story.

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Nigerian Filmmakers Optimistic After Box Office Milestone

The Nigerian film industry, often referred to as Nollywood, is the second largest moviemaker in the world in terms of volume, and is making strides both in terms of art and in popularity at the box office. Timothy Obiezu reports from Abuja.

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Zelenskyy Hails Oscar Win for Harrowing Ukrainian Documentary ’20 Days in Mariupol’

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Ukraine’s Oscar-Winning Director Says He Would Exchange Award for No War

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The 96th Academy Awards

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List of Oscar Winners

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‘Oppenheimer’ wins best picture at Academy Awards, Emma Stone takes best actress

Los Angeles — “Oppenheimer,” a solemn three-hour biopic that became an unlikely billion-dollar box-office sensation, was crowned best picture at a 96th Academy Awards that doubled as a coronation for Christopher Nolan.

After passing over arguably Hollywood’s foremost big-screen auteur for years, the Oscars made up for lost time by heaping seven awards on Nolan’s blockbuster biopic, including best actor for Cillian Murphy, best supporting actor for Robert Downey Jr. and best director for Nolan.

In anointing “Oppenheimer,” the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences did something it hasn’t done for more than a decade: hand its top prize to a widely seen, big-budget studio film. In a film industry where a cape, dinosaur or Tom Cruise has often been a requirement for such box office, “Oppenheimer” brought droves of moviegoers to theaters with a complex, fission-filled drama about J. Robert Oppenheimer and the creation of the atomic bomb.

“For better or worse, we’re all living in Robert Oppenheimer’s world,” said Murphy in his acceptance speech. “I’d like to dedicate this to the peacemakers.”

As a film heavy with unease for human capacity for mass destruction, “Oppenheimer” also emerged – even over its partner in cultural phenomenon, “Barbie” – as a fittingly foreboding film for times rife with cataclysm, man-made or not. Sunday’s Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles unfolded against the backdrop of wars in Gaza and Ukraine, and with a potentially momentous U.S. election on the horizon.

The most closely watched contest of the Academy Awards went to Emma Stone, who won best best actress for her performance as Bella Baxter in “Poor Things.”

In what was seen as the night’s most nail-biting category, Stone won over Lily Gladstone of “Killers of the Flower Moon.” Gladstone would have become the first Native American to win an Academy Award.

Instead, Oscar voters couldn’t resist the full-bodied extremes of Stone’s “Poor Things” performance. The win for Stone, her second best actress Oscar following her 2019 win for “La La Land,” confirmed the 35-year-old as arguably the preeminent big-screen actress of her generation. The list of women to win best actress two or more times is illustrious, including Katherine Hepburn, Frances McDormand, Ingrid Bergman and Bette Davis.

“Oh, boy, this is really overwhelming,” said Stone.

Nolan has had many movies in the Oscar mix before, including “Inception,” “Dunkirk” and “The Dark Knight.” But his win Sunday for direction is the first Academy Award for the 53-year-old filmmaker.

In his acceptance speech, Nolan noted cinema is just over a hundred years old.

“We don’t know where this incredible journey is going from here,” said Nolan. “But to think that I’m a meaningful part of it means the world to me.”

Protest and politics intruded on an election-year Academy Awards on Sunday, where demonstrations for Gaza raged outside the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, and awards went to “Oppenheimer,” “The Zone of Interest” and “20 Days in Mariupol.”

Sunday’s broadcast, hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, had plenty of razzle dazzle, including a sprawling song-and-dance rendition of the “Barbie” hit “I’m Just Ken” by Ryan Gosling, with an assist on guitar by Slash. A sea of Kens swarmed the stage.

The lead winner, as expected was “Oppenheimer,” the blockbuster biopic. Though not quite the clean sweep that some expected, “Oppenheimer” was overpowering all competition — including its release-date companion, “Barbie” — winning awards for its cinematography, editing, score and Robert Downey Jr.’s supporting performance.

Downey, nominated twice before (for “Chaplin” and “Tropic Thunder”), notched his first Oscar, crowning the illustrious second act of his up-and-down career.

“I’d like to thank my terrible childhood and the academy, in that order,” said Downey, the son of filmmaker Robert Downey Sr.

“Barbie,” last year’s biggest box-office hit with more than $1.4 billion in ticket sales, didn’t win an award until almost three hours into the ceremony. It won best song (sorry, Ken) for Billie Eilish and Finneas’ “What Was I Made For?” It’s their second Oscar, two years after winning for their James Bond theme, “No Time to Die.”

But after an awards season that stayed largely inside a Hollywood bubble, geopolitics played a prominent role. Protests over Israel’s war in Gaza snarled traffic around the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, slowing stars’ arrival on the red carpet and turning the Oscar spotlight toward the ongoing conflict. Some protesters shouted “Shame!” at those trying to reach the awards.

Jonathan Glazer, the British filmmaker whose chilling Auschwitz drama “The Zone of Interest” won best international film, drew connections between the dehumanization depicted in his film and today.

“Right now, we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people, whether the victims of October the 7th in Israel, or the the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims, this dehumanization, how do we resist?”

The war in Gaza was on the minds of many attendees, as was the war in Ukraine. A year after “Navalny” won the same award, Mstyslav Chernov’s “20 Days in Mariupol,” a harrowing chronicle of the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, won best documentary. The win, a first for The Associated Press and PBS’ “Frontline,” came as the war in Ukraine passed the two-year mark with no signs of abating.

Mstyslav Chernov, the Ukrainian filmmaker and AP journalist whose hometown was bombed the day he learned of his Oscar nomination, spoke forcefully about Russia’s invasion.

“This is the first Oscar in Ukrainian history,” said Chernov. “And I’m honored. Probably I will be the first director on this stage to say I wish I’d never made this film. I wish to be able to exchange this (for) Russia never attacking Ukraine.”

In the early going, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Frankenstein-riff “Poor Things” ran away with three prizes for its sumptuous craft, including awards for production design, makeup and hairstyling and costume design.

Kimmel, hosting the ABC telecast for the fourth time, opened the awards with a monologue that drew a few cold looks (from Downey, Sandra Hüller and Messi, the dog from best-picture nominee “Anatomy of a Fall”). But Kimmel, emphasizing Hollywood as “a union town” following 2023’s actor and writer strikes, drew a standing ovation for bringing out teamsters and behind-the-scenes workers — who are now entering their own labor negotiations.

The night’s first award was one of its most predictable: Da’Vine Joy Randolph for best supporting actress, for her performance in Alexander Payne’s “The Holdovers.” An emotional Randolph was accompanied to the stage by her “Holdovers” co-star Paul Giamatti.

“For so long I’ve always wanted to be different,” said Randolph. “And now I realize I just need to be myself.”

Though Randolph’s win was widely expected, an upset quickly followed. Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron” won for best animated feature, a surprise over the slightly favored “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.” Miyazaki, the 83-year-old Japanese anime master who came out of retirement to make “The Boy and the Heron,” didn’t attend the ceremony. He also didn’t attend the 2003 Oscars when his “Spirited Away” won the same award.

Best original screenplay went to “Anatomy of a Fall,” which, like “Barbie,” was penned by a couple: director Justine Triet and Arthur Harari. “This will help me through my midlife crisis, I think,” said Triet.

In adapted screenplay, where “Barbie” was nominated — and where some suspected Greta Gerwig would win after being overlooked for director — the Oscar went to Cord Jefferson, who wrote and directed his feature film debut “American Fiction.” He pleaded for executives to take risks on young filmmakers like himself.

“Instead of making a $200 million movie, try making 20 $10 million movies,” said Jefferson, previously an award-winning TV writer.

The Oscars belonged largely to theatrical-first films. Though it came into the awards with 19 nominations, Netflix was a bit player. Its lone win came for live action short: Wes Anderson’s “The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar,” based on the story by Roald Dahl.

While “Barbie” bested (and helped lift) “Oppenheimer” at the box office, it took a back seat to Nolan’s film at the Oscars. Gerwig was notably overlooked for best director, sparking an outcry that some, even Hillary Clinton, said mimicked the patriarchy parodied in the film.

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Hollywood Heads to the Oscars With ‘Oppenheimer’ the Odds-on Favorite 

Los Angeles — Hollywood’s glitterati gather on Sunday to celebrate the best performances in film at the annual Academy Awards, a ceremony expected to turn into a toast to blockbuster atomic bomb drama “Oppenheimer.”

Talk show host Jimmy Kimmel returns for the fourth time to emcee the film industry’s highest honors from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

“Oppenheimer,” the three-hour drama directed by Christopher Nolan, leads the field with 13 nominations. The movie is the frontrunner to win the prestigious best picture prize, capping its sweep of other major awards this year.

“If the best picture isn’t ‘Oppenheimer,’ it will be one of the biggest upsets, if not the biggest upset, in the history of the Oscars,” said Scott Feinberg, executive editor for awards at The Hollywood Reporter.

After 2023 was marred by actors and writers strikes, the Oscars give Hollywood a chance to celebrate two global hits. “Oppenheimer” and feminist doll adventure “Barbie,” another best picture nominee, brought in a combined $2.4 billion in a summer box office battle dubbed “Barbenheimer.”

Oscar producers said they have planned unannounced cameos and other surprises to entertain audiences at home.

“My biggest hope is that they go through a range of emotions with us, that they feel happiness and joy, that we maybe make them shed a tear,” Executive Producer Raj Kapoor said. “And then they somehow feel connected and inspired to also live their dreams.”

Supporting actor nominee Ryan Gosling will sing the ’80s-style rock anthem “I’m Just Ken” from “Barbie.” Members of the Osage Nation will perform the nominated “Wahzhazhe (A Song for My People)” from “Killers of the Flower Moon.”

Cillian Murphy, the Irish actor who played physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer as he led the race to build the first atomic bomb, is considered the favorite for best actor. Murphy’s main competition, according to awards pundits, is “The Holdovers” star Paul Giamatti.

Best actress may go to Lily Gladstone of “Killers of the Flower Moon,” the real-life story about a murder plot to take over lucrative Osage oil rights in 1920s Oklahoma. If she prevails, Gladstone would be the first Native American actress to win an acting Oscar.

Gladstone’s rivals include previous Oscar winner Emma Stone, nominated this year for playing a woman revived from the dead in the dark and wacky comedy “Poor Things.”

The supporting actor race features “Oppenheimer” star Robert Downey Jr., who played the scientist’s professional nemesis, and Sterling K. Brown from “American Fiction.”

Da’Vine Joy Randolph, praised for her role as a grieving mother in “The Holdovers,” vies for best supporting actress against Danielle Brooks from “The Color Purple” and others.

“Barbie,” last year’s No. 1 film with $1.4 billion in global ticket sales, may be shut out of the top awards. Billie Eilish’s “Barbie” ballad “What Was I Made For?” is likely to win the original song prize, Feinberg said, and could snag the awards for costumes and production design.

For Nolan, the night could bring his first directing Oscar, as well as the award for adapted screenplay. The director of “The Dark Knight” trilogy, “Inception” and other acclaimed films has never had a movie win best picture.

The ceremony may end with “the industry-wide coronation for Christopher Nolan,” Feinberg said. With “Oppenheimer,” “he has he has made his best possible argument yet for why he is worthy of this recognition.”

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Michigan Museum Reveals Complex Heritage of Cambodian Art

New York — Six years ago, Nachiket Chanchani visited Angkor Wat for the first time. Inspired, the architectural historian began thinking about the relationship between the complexities of modern post-genocide Cambodia and the ancient temple complex.

Chanchani, an associate art history professor at the University of Michigan, kept reflecting on Angkor Wat, juxtaposing the temple complex against art created since the Khmer Rouge killed nearly 2 million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979.

During the pandemic, his thoughts crystallized amid worldwide suffering, anxiety and fear. “I thought that this art, both from the deep past and from more recent times in Cambodia, can teach us lessons of how to kind of stay stable, find some way forward,” he told VOA Khmer Service via Zoom.

The University of Michigan Museum of Art, or UMMA, one of the largest university museums in the United States, is now exhibiting 80 pieces of Cambodian art in a show guest curated by Chanchani in Ann Arbor. Titled “Angkor Complex: Cultural Heritage and Post-Genocide Memory in Cambodia,” it opened February 3 and runs through July 28. Featured artists Vann Nath, Sopheap Pich, Svay Sareth, Amy Lee Sanford and Leang Seckon, who live in Cambodia and the U.S., have pieces in the exhibit.

The Angkor Archaeological Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site, covers more than 400 square kilometers (155 square miles). Once a city of nearly a million people, the site contains some of Cambodia’s most famous structures, including those recognized worldwide after being seen in movies such as “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and In the Mood for Love.”

Playing with the dictionary meanings of “complex” such as “a whole made up of complicated or interrelated parts,” “a building or group of buildings housing related units” or “a group of repressed desires and memories that exerts a dominating influence upon the personality,” Chanchani saw how the exhibit could “allow us to think about these different layers, these different kinds of ideas of complexness.”

Today, “Cambodians regard Angkor Wat as a sacred center, a national symbol, and a site of memory,” according to the exhibition guide.

“Like Angkor Wat’s bullet-ridden walls, contemporary artworks from Cambodia and its diaspora bear the scars of a genocide and of related upheavals,” said Chanchani, adding that as a non-Cambodian outsider, he was aware of the exhibition’s sensitive nature. “It’s not as if this is something that happened a thousand years ago that you can just say, it happened,” he said. “The survivors are still there.”

Chanchani hoped bringing Cambodian art to the U.S. would console viewers.

But what could the U.S., one of the biggest economic and military powers learn from Cambodia, a small southeast Asian country, other than how to move on from painful memories and what the exhibition catalog describes as the current interwoven global crises of “public health, economic instability, authoritarian regimes, racial injustice and climate change?”

And how does one nation heal from an event like the Khmer Rouge killing nearly a quarter of the population in its quest to create an agrarian utopia for worker-peasants?

For some Cambodians, it can seem as if, 40 years later, the nation can barely move on or show off a new face when it is still being referred to in the context of the past suffering, especially on the international stage.

Reaksmey Yean, a Cambodian art writer, curator and researcher in Phnom Penh, applauded the Michigan show, but added it is a “cliche” because Angkor Wat and the Khmer Rouge have been overused to identify Cambodia.

“An exhibition about Cambodia, its history and culture is rare in the U.S., so I think it is important to have the exhibition to put Cambodia on the map,” Reaksmey Yean told VOA Khmer Service. “However, it is a cliche for me because it’s been more than 20 years when our civil war completely ended and there are so much in our cultures that can be shown.”

Museum Director Christina Olsen said the audience will have a chance to learn about the “distinct cultural and political [significance] of Cambodia” through the historical and contemporary arts by Cambodian and diasporic artists.

“At the same time, the exhibition invites consideration of today’s broader cultural, social and political happenings and fosters dialogue about the lessons that can be taken from the pain and resilience of the Cambodian people,” she added in the press release.

Svay Sareth is a Cambodian artist whose works in sculpture, installation and durational performance “are made using materials and processes intentionally associated with war — metals, uniforms, camouflage and actions requiring great endurance,” according to the Richard Koh Gallery in Singapore. Sareth’s interest in how Cambodia was affected by war and how its people are moving on has informed his art.

“I want the audience in the U.S. [to] see how the post genocide in Cambodia affect the intergeneration,” Sareth said.

Another work, “Full Circle,” by Khmer American artist Amy Lee Sanford, is comprised of 40 broken clay pots, repaired and installed in a circle. She is known for her “Break Pot” performance pieces where she would drop the clay pot from a height, then glue all the pieces back together, an effort to show how situations can change in seconds and even when repaired, can never be the same again.

Sanford said she hopes the Michigan exhibition will show that Cambodians “have a memory of some of the important architectural and religious structures … and that also that there are contemporary artists now doing things related to history and related to looking forward as well.”

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