This painting is a commission from the Grand Hotel Raffles in Siem Reap, Cambodia, a city home to the famous Angkor temples. Nestled within the Grand Hotel is a charming and picturesque bar named the ‘Elephant Bar,’ whose manager wished a painting capturing the ambiance of the place.

The building boasts a rich history, having been inaugurated in 1932 by King Monivong, marking the burgeoning tourism of the affluent classes, particularly from America. Everything within exudes refinement, remaining faithful to the original ‘Heritage’ architecture.

The elephant symbolizes memory, and the painting thus seeks to delve into the nearly 100 years of the establishment. The background is golden, as if to signify the ‘golden age’ of that era, a time somewhat carefree. Adorning the crown atop the elephant’s skull are the spires of the Angkor Wat temple. Below, the hotel’s birth year, 1932, in Art Deco lettering.

Upon the forehead, within a peephole adorned with geometric details, lies an image of the hotel’s facade. Flanking this image, two vintage keys symbolize hospitality and open-mindedness.

The central golden markings placed on each ring of the elephant’s trunk serve as a sort of countdown of time passing. The trunk bifurcates into two parts resembling tree trunks (or the aerial roots of the strangler figs that embrace all the ancient temples of Angkor). These long stems ascend towards the elephant’s skull, symbolizing a continuous return to fundamentals: the temples, the hotel where the visitor comes to rest, each nourishing the other in a perpetual motion that no historical fracture (crises, Khmer Rouge) has truly managed to sever.

Thus, this painting is a contemplation on the persistence of memory, the immutable memory, and the intimate connection between millennia-old architecture (the Temples) and a century-old building (the hotel) aging in a form of nonchalant complementarity.

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