Allison Chhorn explores the daily routine and rituals practised by her Cambodian-Australian family. Reperformed and documented through a process of embodied empathy, acts of service such as gardening and cooking play out as echoes from the past across a sound and image installation displayed in a shade house. Spectres, shadows, and aural textures conjure impressions of a place that remembers how its inhabitants once lived.
Chhorn’s films obliquely approach the echoing traumas, memories, beliefs, and behaviours of her family, particularly set against the Australian context.
Allison Chhorn, Skin Shade Night Day (video still), 2022, shadow of tree cast onto shadehouse, multi-channel video installation. Courtesy the artist and ACE, South Australia
Adelaide Contemporary Experimental
4 June to 13 August 2022
South Australia
