It’s been more than a year our visual arts students have been on and off school following the Government’s protocol as the pandemic spread over the Country. We had shown you back then how the first home confinement had provided Phare artists with time to reflect on this huge wave affecting us all. While Cambodia is facing a new outbreak, they have been expressing their insights and their appeal to pay closer attention to protect ourselves and others. Have a look at their latest works!

“My family’s connection to Phare, as I came to learn, dates back to the 1980’s when my father, as a Member of the Executive Committee of one of the resistance groups at the Thai-Cambodian border, had an oversight responsibility of the civilian affairs of all the refugee camps the group was overseeing, of which Site 2 – where Phare founders grew up and started drawing classes – was part of.”

After the most difficult year in our history, including the closure of our circuses with disastrous impact on funding, we have triumphed against the odds to win four gold awards at the Stevie International Business Awards (IBAs)! Phare has just been recognised once again for our audacious 24 hour circus World record attempt and fundraiser.

This June 2021, the Cambodian Ministry of Education announced that all schools will remain closed and children will continue learning through online classes. For rural and less privileged communities, it still means a lot of active participation from teachers and parents to compensate for the lack of access to internet and digital devices, and the long term gap it is digging to reach back the standard education level all children are entitled to get.

Phare is still taking an active role in the ‘Love Does Not Hurt Campaign’: a three-year advocacy campaign launched in 2020 to push for an end to Humiliating/Corporal Punishment and to promote Positive Discipline in the Southeast Asian Region. In May and June, our social support team conducted a new series of awareness sessions in 16 villages of Battambang Province, to which more than 330 persons attended. You might not be familiar with the concepts of Corporal Punishment and Positive Discipline? Read our article to know more!

This pandemic has brought the inequality and inequity in education to the forefront. While we did our best in extending kindergarten classes to the communities with “home” schooling, this reality gave us the motivation to take a fresh look at our Kindergarten serving 200 children.

History was made at 08.10AM on Monday 8th March, when no less than 90 Phare circus performers took a final bow after a continuous circus performance that lasted 24h, 10min and 30sec in a stunningly ambitious Guinness World Record attempt in the category of Longest Circus Show.

Do you want to be a Guinness World Record Breaker?
And help Cambodia’s leading arts and education NGO Phare survive the pandemic?
Then please join us on March 7th for our thrilling virtual gala and record-breaking Longest Circus Peformance Ever!

Those who have visited our campus after fall 2019 must remember the iconic «Anapyabal» mural on our circus building, painted by the world-famous Irish urban artist FinDac. After his visit to  Cambodia and Phare, he made limited edition prints of Anapyabal for Cambodia sold through our partner Tribe Gallery and another one for the international audience. 100% of profits have been donated towards Phare Visual and Applied Arts School students’ scholarship fund. 

Along with our main programs targeting the youth, we continue to develop greater community outreach projects with « Voice of older people », which aims to use the arts as an innovative tool to raise awareness in the community about the condition and challenges of the elderly women, and notably the disabled.