Ingrid Muan

Ingrid Muan (1964, Virginia, USA — 30 Jan. 2005, Phnom Penh) was a Doctor in Art History, an art teacher, and a passionate researcher on Cambodian traditional and modern arts since 1994, when she moved to Cambodia. Her PhD dissertation is ​“Citing Angkor: The ​“Cambodian Arts” in the Age of Restoration 1918 – 2000,” (Columbia University, 2001).

Born from Norwegian and German parents who emigrated to America after World War II, Ingrid Muan started to teach at the the Royal University of Fine Arts (RUFA), and co-founded the Reyum Foundation with partner Ly Daravuth in 1998. According to historian Ashley Thompson, Reyum ​“came to play a key role in the development of a twenty-first-century Cambodian art scene,” and many testimonials of tose times have vouched for that.

She authored several books related to Cambodian arts, architecture and material culture, and directed an art school for poor children. Kbach, a compendium of Khmer ornament motifs completed with visual arts professor Chan Vitharin, remains a major reference study on the subject.

Read Ingrid Muan’s paper, ​“Playing With Powers: The Politics of Art in Newly Independent Cambodia”, presented posthumously in Feb. 2005 after her premature passing (From Udaya, vol.6)