This publication by photographer Giovanna Silva and writer Peter Fröeberg Idling retraces the history of Cambodia, creating a fictional and personal story that looks at the country through the eyes of the two authors. Today's Phnom Penh cityscape photographs take on a singular dimension in comparison to the ruins of Khmer temples, with a sense of emptiness and abandonment that resonates with the invasion of Phnom Penh by the Khmer Rouge in 1975.
“It could be said that this is the story of two men who were born in the Cambodian countryside in the mid-1920s. Two men who would leave their mark on their homeland. One as the country's foremost architect and town-and-country planner, the other as one of the blood-soaked 20th century's most blood-soaked dictators.”––Peter Fröberg Idling
On April 17, 1975, the Khmer Rouge marched on Phnom Penh led, among others, by Brother Number One, Pol Pot, real name Saloth Sar. As the city's inhabitants tried to celebrate as best they could Cambodian new year, which falls between 15 and 17 April, on the evening of April 16 fireworks and firecrackers exploded against the background of the darkening sky together with the firing of weapons. The number of dead in the three and a half years of Pol Pot's rule will never be established with precision. With the fall of the Shianouk regime its leading architect also disappeared. Vann Molyvann rebuilt the country taking his inspiration from the temples of Angkor Wat. The Olympic stadium is one of the country's prominent modern buildings. It is said that officials of the Lon Nol government were gathered here to be executed during the revolution.
Giovanna Silva (born 1980 in Milan) is an Italian photographer, writer and publisher. Her photographic books have been published by Mousse, Hatje Cantz, and Nero among others. Her work has been shown at the 10th and 14th Venice architectural biennales, MACRO in Rome, Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa in Venice, the Triennale in Milan, the American Academy in Rome, FRAC Orléans, c/o Berlin, the Biennale de Rabat 2019, and the Italian Cultural Institute in New York. She is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Humboldt Books and the co-founder of San Rocco magazine. She teaches Photography at NABA Milan, IUAV Venice's master in photography program, and ISIA Urbino.
Peter Fröberg Idling (born 1972 in Stockholm) is a Swedish writer and novelist. He is most well-known for his non-fiction book on Cambodian leader Pol Pot, Pol Pots leende (2006).
