Séra, Illustrator: Lines of Memory and Exile

The exhibition “Séra, Illustrator: The Line and Memory” opens on January 21, 2026, at the Gallery of the French Institute of Cambodia, inviting visitors to explore the graphic universe of a Franco-Cambodian artist whose drawings weave together personal trauma and collective history.

From the opening reception at 6:30 p.m. until March 21, 2026, this free retrospective showcases original plates, reproductions, and emblematic projects, examining how drawing becomes a language of cultural translation between France and Cambodia.

The Journey of an Exiled Artist

Phouséra Ing, known as Séra, was born in 1961 in Phnom Penh to a Khmer father and a French mother. He fled Cambodia in 1975 after the fall of the capital to the Khmer Rouge, losing his father, who was executed by the regime. Settled in France, he earned a master’s degree (DEA) in Fine Arts at the Sorbonne in 1987 and published his first comic book in 1979. Much of his artistic work has since been devoted to preserving Cambodian memory.An illustrator, sculptor, painter, and comic art teacher at Paris I University since 1989, Séra embodies a living bridge between two cultures. His memorial “To Those Who Are No Longer Here”, inaugurated in 2018 at the Tuol Sleng Museum, stands as a powerful testimony to this dual heritage.

Landmark Works and the Duty of Memory

Through Impasse et rouge (1995, prefaced by Jacques Tardi), L’Eau et la Terre (2005), and Lendemains de cendres (2007), Séra revisits Cambodia’s civil war and genocide, merging childhood memories with historical events to denounce violence without compromise.His graphic novel Concombres amers (Bitter Cucumbers, 2018, Marabout), the result of seven years of work, delves into the roots of tragedy from 1967 to 1975, using imagery to challenge clichés and make palpable the horror he witnessed from the age of nine.His work on L’Anarchiste by Soth Polin (Éditions de la Table Ronde, 2025) illustrates a hybrid novel blending autobiography and fiction, reaffirming his role as an interpreter of Franco-Khmer imaginaries.

Drawing as a Space of Liberation

The exhibition questions the role of the drawn line as a medium for personal and collective memory, featuring previews from Séra’s forthcoming book alongside his emblematic works. Forced into exile at age 14, Séra transforms trauma into liberating art, as he explains: words alone are insufficient in the face of violence—only drawing can convey raw reality.