The Return of Pol-Pot

( Size: 17" x 32.75" Oils )

Kampuchea, former name Cambodia. A country in SE Asia, in the Indo-China Peninsula on the Gulf of Thailand. It consists mainly of an alluvial plain drained by the river Pekong and enclosed by mountains. Most of the inhabitants are Khmers, with small minorities of Vietnamese and Chinese. The economy is predominantly agricultural, the staple crop being rice. Production has been severely reduced by the recent political upheavals and there is very little industry.

Official language: Khmer; French is widely spoken.
Currency: riel of 100 sen, population approx.; 8,000,000
Capital and the countries main port: Phnom Penh.

After the formation of a new constitution in 1975, the Khmer Rouge government led by Pol-Pot attempted to reshape the country's economy on co-operative lines by driving the Kampucheans out of the towns, depriving them of their property and killing some three million of the aged, the sick or the dissenting. In 1978 after the nightmare of Pol-Pot, the Vietnamese invaded and a People's Revolutionary Council was set up under Heng Samrin. The retreating Khmer Rouge burnt existing rice stocks, devastated the land, leaving behind them a trail of famine and disease - and the endless mountains of skulls of the 'Killing Fields'. This being Pol-Pot's legacy to mankind.

Now it seems that this psychopath is hell-bent on a return to regain power over Kampuchea. The rest of the world, with the knowledge within recent history before them, seem to be oblivious except for a few muted raised voices aware of the evils to come. History once again, if unchecked, will undoubtedly repeat itself.

Subjects in the painting:

The Man with Hand Held Out

This figure, all powerful of Pol-Pot, who probably believed he came as a saviour, but in the reality he became an evil, tyrannical, megalomaniac. Taking away the dreams and the light from peoples destinies, he held the power of forced darkness.

The Grim Reaper

The oppressive stench of death, like a dark cloud hanging over the demoniac presence of Pol-Pot.

The Emaciated Black Man

By depicting the already oppressed and depraved black man as to an Indo-Chinese person, this portrays that the only people to suffer under any oppressive regime are the weak and ordinary: poor people. So the colour of the skin is immaterial. The suffering is elongated usually by controlled starvation, forced labour, and eventual death, ubiquitous with the presence of the force of evil within Pol-Pot's despotic regime.

The Elephant

Another of Mother Earth's children sought after for man's pleasure. These gentle creatures who by man's greed are on the verge of extinction, are to man synonymous with the realms of memory, so we must act quickly so as to never forget the lessons taught to us by history.

Stone Structure & Ghostly Apparition within

Represents Kampuchea, and its history and beliefs. These cannot be eroded by the onslaught of violence of Pol-Pot's regime. The ghostly figure holds up a shield, this represents that the fight, even though taken underground, will with fervent tenacity ensure the downfall of this evil man's return.

The Empty Plate

Life without sustenance, controlling the food chain, death becomes a way of releasing oneself of this slow but deliberate horror.

E.W.Powell 22/8/90

Complexity comment:
Utopian thinking imagines a 'perfect' end result, and then tries to enforce it in one vast move (change required equals end state minus start state). This cannot work. Complexity studies show that, for closely interacting systems, change in one parameter will cause co-evolutionary changes in unexpected others - so plans based on assuming that those will remain unchanged will fail (as they do not take into account the inevitable shifts in important variables).

To move from one position to another, a step by step process is required. In other words, evolutionary progression not catastrophism. We perform a directed walk of micro-improvements and eventually will reach our goal, as long as we monitor each result and plan the next move from the NEW starting position.