Phare Ponleu Selpak Theater

Website: http://ponleu-selpak.org/

Phare Ponleu Selpak is an arts school and cultural organisation based in Battambang province, Cambodia, that offers training in circus arts, theatre, music and visual arts. The organisation operates a training campus and presents public performances that showcase student and professional work.

Programmes combine vocational training with cultural and social development, and the troupe formed from the school has toured regionally and internationally. The organisation also runs outreach activities and workshops aimed at children and young people in the surrounding community.

Located in the city of Battambang, the school is a focal point for local cultural activity and attracts visitors who attend evening circus performances and exhibitions.

• Regular performances: Evening performances by the school’s circus troupe are regularly scheduled and open to the public, combining acrobatics, theatre and music.

What to See#

• Training campus and performance venue: Training and rehearsal spaces in Battambang where students study circus arts, theatre, music and visual arts and where daily or nightly public performances are staged.
• Outreach and touring: Community outreach projects, vocational workshops and touring ensembles that support social development and generate performance work for the troupe.

Phare Ponleu Selpak is in Battambang city, a short tuk‑tuk ride from the central market and the railway pagoda area. From Battambang bus station it’s typically a 5-15 minute ride depending on traffic; from Phnom Penh expect a 3-4 hour bus journey. Negotiate transport in advance for evening performances.

• Catch a performance in the evening-dance and theatre are the best way to see the school's work.
• Take a tuk‑tuk from Battambang's central market; negotiate a return time with the driver.
• Ask permission before photographing students in classrooms; performances and rehearsals are often shared but sacred.

Phare Ponleu Selpak, meaning “the brightness of art”, grew out of drawing workshops held for children in the Site 2 refugee camp on the Thai border in 1986. The idea of a creative association that would use art and self-expression to help young refugees overcome the trauma of war continued after they returned home, and the organisation was formally founded in 1994 by a group of former Site 2 children.

Over the years its mission has broadened to support formal education, foster social action, and develop talent in circus, theatre, music and the visual arts. Regular circus performances and gallery showings, staged both on site and occasionally beyond Battambang, sustain the social enterprise and the disadvantaged Cambodian youth and families it continues to support.