The Angkor Photo Festival & Workshops launched its first iteration in 2005 with the aim of providing an affordable and accessible educational and professional platform for the region’s emerging photographic community. We have maintained this mission ever since, even as we adapted and evolved alongside the community we serve.

Now Southeast Asia’s longest-running international photography event, we believe in the importance of supporting the vibrant and dynamic photographic community in Asia. We do this by creating a welcoming and safe space for lens-based practitioners in the region to access to professional development and educational opportunities, and by actively seeking and promoting Asian contributions to the medium and language of photography.

Through our annual festival programme and workshops for Asian photographers, we became established as a key gathering space for the close-knit network of workshop alumni and other festival participants which formed over the years. Many would also return to become involved as volunteers, curators and mentors.

We believe solidarity, a sense of community and access to peer support are essential components in facilitating the creation of impactful work, especially in a region which is experiencing a rise in autocracy, where journalists and artists alike are seen as threats to the state in many countries.

In 2018, key members from our community of tutors, alumni and festival veterans came together to form a new Asian-majority organising committee. The diverse 13-member committee, created simultaneously with Jessica Lim stepping in as the new director, comprises of six alumni from our professional workshops. This reflected an organic evolution and brings us closer to our goal of a self-sustainable model led by Asian photography professionals.

Our pre-pandemic programme consists of professional workshops, public exhibitions, projection evenings, portfolio reviews and artist talks. Following the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, we adapted our programme to be presented completely online for our 16th Edition. In 2021, our organising committee reassessed our priorities to focus on meeting the needs of our community during an unpredictable pandemic, pivoting from an event-based model to a series of online activities aimed at providing professional support and creative motivation.

We are grateful to be hosted in Siem Reap, Cambodia, a region with immense historical significance and home to the magnificent Angkor temples and successive capitals of the great Khmer Empire.

The Angkor Photo Association is a non-profit cultural association registered under 1901 Law in France. All our events are free to attend, and open to the public.