I Am A Visual Artist: Sayon Syprasoeuth

Sayon Syprasoeuth is Visual Artist, Lecturer at California State University Long Beach, and a Program Manager at United Cambodian Community. Sayon is a survivor. His artworks and images are reflective of his own journey as a Cambodian refugee – from his shocking exile from his childhood village on the Cambodian-Thai border, to his scary passage into Thailand countryside and his lost boyhood in a refugee camp where making art was his imagination safeguard – to his passage from his Buddhist-animist land to Christian America. His work holds fast his connection to the Cambodian spirit-enhancing land, cross-cultural dimensions, and his drive to animate Apsara and other essential images of beauty alongside the grotesque.

Sayon received his MFA from Claremont Graduate University, BFA from California State University Long Beach. IG: @sayonart

What are you eating for comfort these days?

Ice cream and lots of food, wine and beer!

What are you binge watching? Playing on repeat?

Melancholy music like Aimee Mann, Nico, Leonard Cohen and others.

What was the last song you had stuck in your head?

These Days by Nico.

What is your favorite unpopular opinion?

Mask on!!

What was the last thing that made you smile or laugh?

My cat smiling at me :-)

What is the most interesting piece of art you've seen?

Valie Export's work! Valie Export (often written as 'VALIE EXPORT') (born May 17, 1940 in Linz as Waltraud Lehner, later Waltraud Höllinger) is an Austrian artist. Her artistic work includes video installations, body performances, expanded cinema, computer animations, photography, sculptures and publications covering contemporary arts.

Is there anything else you'd like to tell our readers?

Keep making art and reach for excellence in it!