This project functions as a physical and historical "homecoming" centered in the district of Moung Ruessei and the wider Battambang province. Following the survival narrative documented in my mother’s memoir and thesis, Survival During and After Khmer Rouge, I am conducting field research to locate and document unmarked family burial sites and significant historical landscapes.
In post-conflict studies, we often prioritize the physical displacement of people, mapping the movement of refugees across borders and into camps. But we rarely account for the displacement of a family’s visual history. For many in the Cambodian diaspora, our inheritance is defined by a complete visual void.
My work will move from the domestic archives of the United States to the physical soil of Cambodia. Working alongside local monks and in partnership with the Cambodian Centre for Documentary Photography (CCDP), I am mapping "search grids" based on my mother’s written memories of the "men in black uniforms" who reshaped our family lineage on April 17, 1975.
Our research focus is three-fold: site-specific mapping, oral history integration, and the reclamation of forbidden family archives. In Moung Ruessei, the memory of labor camps and trauma is often buried beneath lush, vibrant rice fields. By addressing the silent presence of the Khmer Rouge era, I am using photography to bridge the gap between the Cambodian diaspora and the physical sites of resilience and loss.
Khmer Rouge Stronghold Map and Mass Burial Sites
The goal is to prove that while a regime can attempt to erase a person from the record, the land remains a witness. Through this homecoming, we are asserting that the landscape is not just a setting, it is the archive itself.