AAPI Mobile History Museum:
The Cambodian American Journey

Travelling AAPI History Museum exhibit displayed at:
AAPI History Museum
Brown University
PVD Fest
Lowell Cambodian New Year
West Warwick Library
Park View Middle School
Atria Senior Living

The AAPI Mobile History Museum is a travelling exhibit showcasing different AAPI journeys. Given the range of unique expereinces under one able, this mobile museum asks: what can we accomplish by celebrating our different yet interconnected histories? For The Cambodian American Journey module, the AAPI Mobile History Museum partnered with local Khmer photographer Kannetha Brown. Shot across Providence and its neighboring cities, her portraits center family and friends — many knew her mother, a longtime nurse practitioner. Working with an 8x10 view camera and black-and-white film, Kannetha nods to the past: a subtle echo of the Khmer Rouge’s darkroom images, reclaimed through memory and survival. Her family lived this history — her mother and grandmother are refugees of the Cambodian Genocide, and her grandfather served under Lon Nol. Through her lens, trauma, kinship, and resilience are carried forward. 

“We chose her photos for the Mobile Museum because as a Khmer American herself, she brings an authentic and modern lens to her work. Most Americans know about the Vietnam War but they know less about the Cambodian and Laos civil wars. Kannetha’s work fixes that and more importantly, serves as a bridge overlooking reflections of the past while leading us out of it— Putting faces to stories and cementing Khmer Americans’ place into local history.” –Setha Phongsavan, Acting Museum Manager

More information here.