Fresh Face: Nataly Lee
Unearthing memories in post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia
A&M's Fresh Face is where we profile an emerging artist from the region every month and speak to them about how they kick-started their career, how they continue to sustain their practice and what drives them as artists.
Portrait of Nataly Lee. Image courtesy of the artist.
Occupying the nexus of political archaeology, personal history and popular mythology, Nataly Lee’s process-oriented practice marks a deeply introspective journey of reconnecting with her roots. Born in Battambang, Cambodia, in 1983, Lee was shy of a year old when her family were forced to flee the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime. Crossing the Thai-Cambodian border on foot, the family spent nearly four years at Khao I Dang, a refugee camp along the Cambodia-Thailand border. The family eventually resettled in New Zealand, before moving to Australia. In 2006, Lee graduated from Griffith University with a Bachelor of Arts, and built a career as a photographer and designer. Returning to Cambodia in her adulthood, she dedicated over a decade to running her own design firm in Phnom Penh, before returning to Brisbane to obtain her Master of Visual Arts from Queensland College of Art.
Nataly Lee, Dei, 2025, discarded oil paintings, rice sacks, Khmer silk scraps, thread, plant dyes, 154 x 115cm each. Image courtesy of the artist.
Reconstructing memories of placelessness during her early childhood, Lee’s works bridge personal experiences with broader issues of vulnerability for refugee communities still threatened by civil instability. In KID (2025), the artist silkscreens various images onto green and yellow rice sacks: maps of the Thai-Cambodian border, faded photographs of her family. The abbreviation KID, references both the refugee camp’s name and the fact that she grew up there between the ages of one and four. In Haze I, II, III (2025), Lee deliberately produces hazy photographs of the Cambodian landscape, visualising a refugee’s journey fraught with precarity. Reduced to near abstraction, the photographs also reflect her attempts to access memories which have degraded over time, forming mere impressions in the mind’s eye. In Dei (2025), the artist has stitched together large pieces of cloth from recovered scraps of old paintings, dyed cloth, rice sacks and Khmer silks. In creating the work, Lee resurrects acts of labour undertaken by her mother, who sewed and mended pieces of clothing while awaiting resettlement in the refugee camp. Her works serve as contemporary adaptations of sacred woven banners, often hung in Khmer Buddhist temples. These pieces create a space for spiritual healing, where past traumas are transformed into testaments of resilience.
Nataly Lee, Falling leaves return to their roots, 2025, installation view at Grey Street Projects, earth pigment and oil on canvas, 180 x 140cm. Image courtesy of the artist.
Overlapping the personal with the ecological, Lee’s creative practice engages with the land as a living repository of memories, and a site for metaphysical restoration. In her body of work, earth-bound materials such as gamboge pigment, water hyacinth roots and natural fibres are meticulously refined, evoking the cycle of unearthing traces of violence which have sunk deep into the Cambodian landscape. In Falling leaves return to their roots (2025), Lee embedded the subtle movement of drifting leaves within an abstract canvas of swirling yellow and orange. The work meditates on the inevitable journey one undertakes to return to their origins, resonating with the artist’s own return to Cambodia as an adult. In Khsae (2025), Lee wrapped water hyacinth in luminous yellow threads by hand, creating tangled rope-like forms that allude to sprawling root systems. In Buddhist cultures, threads are used to generate protection and blessings, which the artist incorporates into laborious rituals of care. The work also explores the concept of rootedness within diasporic communities today, reflecting the artist’s experiences navigating tangled familial and cultural ties as a Cambodian-Australian immigrant.
Interview
Nataly Lee, KID, 2025, installation view at Grey Street Projects, Brisbane, Australia, silkscreen print on rice sacks. Image courtesy of the artist.
In the past few years, you have worked extensively as a designer and a photographer, heading your own Phnom Penh-based design studio as well as co-authoring two publications on food and design. What motivated you to turn toward fine art and pursue your Master of Visual Arts at Queensland College of Art (QCA), Brisbane?
From an early age I knew I wanted to do something creative, but growing up in an immigrant family, there was an expectation, or so I thought, to choose a more “serious” path. I did not consider a career in the arts until I was in university.I studied journalism and interned as a stylist for a lifestyle magazine. That was when I realised that working in the creative industries was actually possible.
Even then, fine art was not something I considered. In my twenties, I worked as an editorial and commercial stylist, and later transitioned into design and photography. By the time I turned forty, I had been running my own design studio for over a decade. Most of my days were spent in front of a computer, so I started painting as a way to stay creative, but off the screen.
Despite my creative background I have not had any formal art training, so going back to study felt important to me. I wanted to find a visual language and a supportive environment to cultivate my artistic practice. I remembered taking a film elective at the QCA twenty years earlier, so when I started looking into courses, the college felt like the right fit.
About a month into the programme, I had the realisation that this is what I am meant to be doing. It felt like everything I had learned, done, and lived through was coming together. My practice suddenly had the space to hold what I had carried for so long: memories, stories, questions, ritual, beauty, and belonging. I had spent years moving between mediums; styling, photography, design, video, but this was the first time I could bring those threads together in a way that felt personal, intentional, and grounded. I began to understand that my practice could hold complexity, that it could move across disciplines and still be rooted in something cohesive and honest.
Has your design and photography background shaped your current practice?
Beyond the formal and technical aspects such as understanding composition, colour, and spatial relationships, it has taught me to think critically about how elements relate to one another and to approach making with intention and purpose.
Design, in particular, taught me to work in a process-driven and research-led way, which continues to underpin my practice today. I find it difficult to create something meaningful without grounding it in research. That research often involves lots of reading, looking through archives, or fieldwork such as photographing sites, collecting natural or found materials, and gathering oral histories. These methods help root the work in embodied connection and cultural memory, allowing it to emerge from something felt and lived, rather than imagined. Photography has also shaped the way I see and observe. It refined my awareness of light, texture, composition, and mood, and taught me how to tell stories through image-making. This continues to influence my work.
I approach my work with a sense of curiosity and care, regardless of the form it takes. Each mode of making informs the other, and I create because it is how I process and communicate the things I carry, and the stories I want to tell. I feel fortunate to be able to move between mediums, as sometimes one offers a more fitting or meaningful way to tell a story. This fluidity allows me to respond intuitively to the ideas I am working with, and to stay open to where the work wants to go.
Who has been a mentor or an important artistic influence on your current practice? And why?
To be honest, I did not grow up with a mentor, and for a long time, I felt the absence of that kind of guidance. But over the past year, I have been fortunate to connect with some incredibly generous and encouraging people who have supported me and helped me grow in my practice.
That said, the people who have influenced me the most do not always come from the art world. My influences often come from everyday encounters and relationships; clients, friends, elders in my village, and even strangers, who have shared their stories and ways of seeing the world.
I also want to acknowledge my parents. They have shaped so much of who I am and how I approach my work. My mum, in particular, has passed down rituals, stories, and a deep sense of cultural inheritance that sits at the heart of my practice. My dad instilled in me a love for making, and entrepreneurship. Through his resilience, creativity, and resourcefulness, I learned the value of hard work and tapping into your creativity to create something new.
Nataly Lee, Termite Mound, 2025, earth pigment, oil and oil pastel on canvas. Image courtesy of the artist.
What was one important piece of advice you were given as an artist?
One of the best pieces of advice I have received came from a teacher who told me to always ask why, and if I did not have an answer, to dig deeper. That has really stayed with me and continues to shape how I approach my practice. Whether it is the narrative, the material choices, or the way I construct a work, I try to question every decision.
This mindset has taught me to create with intention. I see my practice as an extension of my life, and in life I am always asking why. That question brings clarity. It gives the work meaning and anchors it in something deeper. I do not choose a colour just because I like it. I choose it because it has something to say, because it holds memory, symbolism, or emotional weight.
Another idea that has stayed with me is something I heard recently on the Talk Art podcast, where artist Sean Scully said that“the reward is the art making.” That really resonated with me. He was speaking to the idea that the act of creating, when done with love, is fulfilling in itself. I try not to focus too much on what the final outcome will be. Instead, I stay close to the intention behind the work. Even though my process is intuitive, it is always grounded in purpose.
Do you make a living completely off being an artist? If not, could you share what other types of work you take on to supplement your income? Do these activities also inform/affect your practice?
I still work as a designer and photographer, partly because it helps support my art practice, but also because it continues to inform how I think and make. I genuinely enjoy working on creative projects for others. It keeps me connected to people and their stories. Art-making can be a solitary process, and you spend a lot of time in your own head. Commercial work offers a way to step outside of my own head and engage with different communities, industries, and ways of thinking. It allows me to be creative in a more collaborative and outward-facing way, which often brings fresh energy back into my own practice.
Another benefit of my background is that I am able to design my own materials and photograph my work for documentation, which saves both time and money. These creative practices are deeply interconnected, and I feel fortunate to be able to move fluidly between them.
Nataly Lee, Khsae, 2025, installation view at Grey Street Projects, Brisbane, Australia, hand-wrapped water hyacinth and thread. Image courtesy of the artist.
You recently opened your latest solo exhibition The Land Is Never Still, The Water Is Never Quiet at Grey Street Projects in Brisbane, Australia. How did this opportunity come about? Could you tell us about your experience preparing for it?
The opportunity came through an open call at QCAD Galleries I applied for. While I initially planned to create an entirely new body of work, I decided to include two paintings that had previously been shown in Siem Reap, as they felt conceptually tied to the rest of the show. The show includes a mix of painting, sculpture, textiles, and moving image.
I do not usually create with a fixed exhibition in mind. I often work on several things at once and move between mediums depending on where my energy or curiosity is. It helps me stay fluid and responsive. If I get stuck on a painting, I might shift to working on a sculpture or editing footage. This rhythm allows space for ideas to surface gradually without forcing resolution.
Preparing for the show meant stepping back and paying attention to the threads that connected each piece: a gesture, a material, a colour, a story. The final exhibition came together by listening to those connections and shaping something that felt honest and close to the heart.
Nataly Lee, Preah Torani, 2025, installation view at Grey Street Projects, Brisbane, Australia, handwoven water hyacinth, clay vessel, 150 x 50 x 50cm. Image courtesy of the artist.
The exhibition title The Land Is Never Still, The Water Is Never Quiet draws from a Khmer proverb that describes our natural environment as a living, spiritual and ever-changing force. How does your relationship with the land guide the exhibition premise and your choice of materials?
As a Cambodian-Australian, my relationship to land is layered and complex. I experience it not just as a physical environment, but as a living archive of ancestral knowledge, cultural memory, and spiritual presence. This body of work grew out of an ongoing inquiry into Khmer cosmology, post-conflict memory, animist worldviews, and everyday rituals. These perspectives, rooted in Cambodian ways of knowing, continue to shape how I make and think.
The exhibition title reflects this worldview, where land and water are seen as animate, spiritual, and constantly shifting. It speaks to an understanding of nature as something that holds memory and emotion, not just in metaphor, but in material and lived experience.
I was born during a time of civil unrest in Cambodia and spent my early years in refugee camps before resettling in New Zealand and later Australia. Returning to Cambodia as an adult transformed my practice into a form of re-rooting. My work is not about resolution; it is about listening, remembering, and giving visual form to what has been inherited.
This approach guided both the premise of the exhibition and my choice of materials. I often work with earth pigments, plant dyes, sand, water hyacinth, rice sacks, silk, and thread, materials that carry histories of survival, labour, spirituality, and place. Through gestures like layering, stitching, wrapping, and gathering, I try to hold space for what has shaped me and stay in conversation with the land and its stories.
Nataly Lee, Kaplouk (still from video), 2025, HD video, stereo, 2-channel, synchronous loop. Image courtesy of the artist.
In the exhibition, you also present Kaplouk, a two-channel moving image work following a 75-year-old woman living on the Tonlé Sap Lake in Cambodia. What motivated you to create this piece, and why did you choose this medium to represent her story?
Kaplouk is my first moving-image work. The project began as an exploration of water hyacinth, a plant I have been using in my sculptural work. Water hyacinth is often seen as invasive, but it is incredibly adaptive and used in many aspects of Cambodian life. I am interested in what it represents: something unwanted that survives, adapts, and finds purpose. In my sculptures, I coil and wrap the plant by hand in a repetitive process that becomes a kind of ritual. I initially intended for the video to document the material and where it comes from.
While filming on Tonlé Sap Lake, I met Yay (the Khmer word for grandmother), who has lived there for most of her life, except during the Khmer Rouge regime where she had to labour on land. As I spent more time with her, it became clear that the work was no longer just about the plant. Yay’s connection to the lake, her gestures, and her lived experience echoed the themes I had been exploring through the material.
The video gave space for her presence and voice to unfold in time, and to be held alongside the texture and rhythm of the lake. In that way, the work became a continuation of how I use materials: to listen, to reflect, and to honour what often goes unseen.
Could you share your favourite art space or gallery in the city where you currently reside? What drew you to that space and what does it offer to your practice?
There are so many great galleries in Brisbane, but my favourite would have to be Milani Gallery. What I admire most about Milani Gallery is their commitment to presenting work that is both materially grounded and conceptually engaged with the world. They represent a number of artists whose work I admire, including Judy Watson, Megan Cope, and D Harding, just to name a few. A lot of the work shown there explores themes of land, politics, cultural inheritance, and the complexities of history, particularly through Indigenous and diasporic perspectives. I leave their exhibitions feeling inspired and reconnected to the reasons I make art. It is a space that pushes me to think more critically about my own practice, while affirming the value of art that is both poetic and politically resonant.
I also love QAGOMA. It is a beautiful institution that consistently presents incredible exhibitions. I especially look forward to the Asia Pacific Triennial, which highlights diverse voices and perspectives from across the region. One of my favourite places in QAGOMA is their research library on the third floor. It is one of Brisbane’s best-kept secrets, and has an amazing collection of art books and catalogues, which is a constant source of inspiration for me.
What are your hopes for the art scene in Cambodia, and regionally as well?
Cambodia has a much smaller art scene compared to other countries in the region, but there are many incredible artists creating thoughtful and important work. Unfortunately, there is still little infrastructure, funding, or institutional support, which makes sustaining an art practice very difficult. My hope is that Cambodian artists will have access to more opportunities, not just for exhibiting their work, but for mentorship, education, residencies, and collaboration. I would love to see more independent and artist-run spaces, critical discourse, and platforms that prioritise experimental and process-driven practices.
Regionally, it is encouraging to see how much momentum there is in Southeast Asia. Cities such as Singapore and Bangkok now have thriving contemporary art scenes, with biennales, art fairs, and institutions that support artists in meaningful ways. There also seems to be a growing interest, both regionally and internationally, in Southeast Asian art and artists. I think we have a lot to contribute to these conversations, particularly around land, history, identity, and resilience, which are themes many artists in the region engage with in unique and powerful ways.
Are there any upcoming exhibitions/projects that you would like to share?
I am currently developing a new body of work that explores Cambodian perceptions of death, spirituality, and ritual. It draws on the cultural traditions of Pchum Ben, the annual festival honouring the dead. In Khmer culture, spirits are not forgotten but remain closely connected to the living. Offerings, prayers, and ritual acts sustain these connections, holding the dead within everyday landscapes and gestures. The work draws from this understanding, evoking a spiritual terrain where memory is material and ritual is a form of care. The project encompasses a series of paintings as well as sculpture, sound, and moving image.
This interview has been edited for length.
Nataly Lee’s The land is never still, the water is never quiet is on view at Grey Street Gallery | Queensland College of Art and Design, Brisbane, from 12 to 23 August 2025.
