Sophanna Keth
Brother and sister, Sotha Keth and Sophanna Keth Yos lived in the New London area near their sister Somaly Hay, a classical Cambodian dancer. The family members who survived the Khmer Rouge genocide, which destroyed so much of Cambodia and its culture from 1974-1979, fled to the US in 1981, and Sophanna followed in 1987. In presenting and teaching Cambodian dance, Sotha, Somaly, Sophanna, and their extended family of friends, colleagues, and relatives were dedicated to helping young Cambodian people retain a sense of Cambodian cultural values through knowledge of their traditions.
One of the problems dancers like Somaly faced after moving here was finding traditional performance costumes. A highly specialized, elaborate art in itself, costume making depends on reproducing stylized clothing forms for the different roles of the classical dance repertoire. Contact with Cambodia was difficult at that time, making the proper materials, patterns, or examples of costume designs unavailable or prohibitively expensive. Sotha and Sophanna began the process of learning and then making the intricate costumes for Somaly, using materials that could be found in America.
Sotha began to design the dance crowns relying on his memory, pictures of classical Cambodian art from library books, and an imaginative, experimental approach to using new materials. "I try to find materials, whatever we could find here in the U.S., to join together, glue, or make by hand, cut and chisel, to make the piece. Finally we did one, then turned to another one because there are so many different crowns needed." He constructed crowns in a variety of ways, refining his methods through trial and error over the years. Most were made of papier mache, painted and covered with copper or aluminum highlights. Sotha had to buy a lathe and learn woodworking, because wood is often the best material for a crown's tall embellishments. The paint must evoke the gold of original crowns, but finding the right shade was difficult. If he could afford it, Sotha would apply gold leaf. He traveled to as many of Somaly's performances as possible, to see how the crowns fit and wear. "I try to make the crowns as light as possible, because the performance takes a couple of hours plus the time it takes to put on the costumes...I want them to feel comfortable. If they feel nice the performance will be good also. If the crown is heavy...they will get sore and tired and the performance will not be good. Whatever the performer feels, that's what I feel too."
Like Sotha, Sophanna's memory of watching dancers at the palace helped her design traditional clothes. She also studied books, slides, and old films showing figures on temple carvings, because dance roles and costumes were often drawn from these beings. Sophanna sewed and embroidered the clothes, adding thousands of beads and sequins by hand to make the costume catch the light and look like gold and silver. Her work did not end there, as she needed to sew parts of the costume onto the dancer before the performance, and cut her out of it afterwards. Sophanna taught her daughter Sokphury how to sew the costumes, since Sokphury has learned to dance with Somaly. "Children came (to America) in the war, they come here very little and grow up here...they don't know their own culture! They ask me, 'What is that worn for?' I say, 'That is your own culture - we wear this for classical dance.' They are interested! At least some youngsters get to know their culture...Some Cambodian ladies came (to a performance in Chicago) and they were so excited because they lost their culture for a long time and now they see it again."
