Nikkei Asia Prizes 2006

Survivor saving art of Cambodian dance

Cambodian classical dance dates back more than a thousand years, yet it was almost completely wiped out in just a few decades under the Khmer Rouge.

Even Pol Pot could not snuff out all embers of hope, however, and Sophiline Cheam Shapiro has been instrumental in nurturing Cambodian classical dance back to life. In the process, the 38-year-old master of Cambodian classical dance has also found a way of melding the tradition with biting social commentary.

Recognized by UNESCO in 2003 as an intangible cultural heritage, Cambodian classical dance features dancers with elaborate gold costumes, who turn and twist their arms and legs with deliberate and unhurried movements.

What makes Shapiro's work so special is the way she introduces creativity into the ancient art, and how she uses it to encourage social change in Cambodia. She said it is possible to adopt Cambodian classical dance to express any social issue, such as the discrimination suffered by women and the difficulty of passing history on to the next generation.

More than 1 million Cambodians were killed during Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot's reign of terror. Cambodian classical dance was prohibited and nearly all dancers were executed.

Shapiro was 8 years old when the Khmer Rouge seized power and forced her family to leave Phnom Penh. She remembers pushing their possessions stacked high on a cart and sleeping on a plastic tarp at night. She also remembers how her father fell ill and breathed his last amid pangs of hunger. These memories are still clear in her mind and serve as a source of creativity.

Having survived the experience, Shapiro was among the first to enroll when the Royal University of Fine Arts reopened in 1981. She later became a teacher at the same university, and it was there in 1990 that she met the visiting American who became her husband. The couple moved to the U.S. and Shapiro launched the study of dance ethnology at the University of California.

Khmer Rouge attacked

Shapiro's first major work was "Samritechak," a dance adaptation of Shakespeare's "Othello." The piece gained attention not only because of the way it fused Western and Eastern cultures, but also because she used the dance to level sharp criticism at the Khmer Rouge leadership for refusing to face the past and admit their crimes.

In 2002, Shapiro opened the Khmer Arts Academy in Long Beach, California, where she teaches classical dance to the area's many Cambodian emigrants.