Bio & Contacts

Miguel Lopes Jeronimo (Portugal, 1987) is a freelance photographer, curator, writer and artist based for nine years in Phnom Penh, with more than 80 exhibitions in Cambodia — including solo and group shows on topics such as environment, social inequality, gender, disability and human rights. With a background in robotics and emotions in artificial intelligence, he’s passionate about photography and working with NGOs on projects with impact, collaborating with other artists and creating art shows with meaning.

His work has appeared in publications such as Le Monde Diplomatique, Southeast Asia Globe, Perspectives Hong Kong, New Naratif in Malaysia and Mekong Review, and selected for festivals from the Cheongju Craft Biennale 2021 in South Korea (bronze awards in the Craft City Lab competition) to ASEM (Asia-Europe Meeting by ASEF Foundation) in the National Museum of Cambodia, from curating an exhibition in BACC (Bangkok Arts and Cultural Center) to being the special jury selection for the global collective exhibition Points of Return in Massachusetts, USA – besides having provided photography and art consultancy to organizations such as UNICEF, WHO, UNAIDS, Pulitzer Center, Heinrich Boll Foundation, UN Migration, IDE, DFAT/AustralianAid, GIZ among many others.

His academic and research background is on affective computing and AI (namely creating AffectiveWall, an intermedia instrument for affective generation of music and paintings through gestural expressivity) and his professional past is in social entrepreneurship in Portugal and India, including co-founding non-profits such as Sapana, Sinergi and Emscan, or projects such as PopCrickets and Startup Pirates Lisbon.

Available for freelance opportunities and collaboration with NGOs and other artists.

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Download my cv and portfolio here.

Contact me through migueljeronimophotography@gmail.com

Or connect with me on instagram.com/migueljeronimophotography and linkedin.com/in/migueljeronimophotography

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A selection of shows from his art career in Cambodia of 80+ exhibitions, both of his work and curating other artists:
# 11seven, a relational aesthetics social installation and community environmental experience in Chang Moi neighborhood, Chiang Mai (February, 2024)
# Jungle on My Mind, as part of a group exhibition in Some Space gallery, Chiang Mai, Thailand (February, 2024)
# Susu, stories of not giving up – in the International Angkor Photo Festival (January, 2024)
# The New Apsaras, as part of a group exhibition in The National Museum of Cambodia (December, 2023)
# Looking back, going forward: 30/30/30 stories of change, w/ hbs – in Metahouse (November, 2023)
# Khmervolution, as part of GenerationC group show – in Montepellier 2030 street art festival (June, 2023)
# Becoming, glass-poems with paintings and illustrations with artists Rena Chheang and Dahlia Phirun – in Sra’art gallery (June, 2023)
# Overflowing, AI-based plastic awareness project for the KAS Waste Summit – in FactoryPP (May, 2023)
# Jungle on my mind, as part of the global exhibition Points of Return curated by A La Luz – Umbrella Arts Center in Concord, Massachusetts, USA (May, 2023)
# A caring hand, with DSF – in the Language Center at the Institut Francais Phnom Penh (March, 2023)
# The artificial irony of prophetic advancements, Ai-generated video as part of a group installation for the European Film Festival – in Perch (February, 2023)
# Pteah Saart pop-up exhibition as part of a campaign to preserve traditional Khmer architecture in rural areas – in Sambor Prei Kuk, Kampong Thom (February, 2023)
# Pray For Prey, Rainforest Exhibition with the Pulitzer Center – curation of an environmental show with more than 20 artists (January, 2023)
# Close Your Eyes and See – all-in-the-dark sensorial exhibition in collaboration with blind people (December, 2022)
# Our Roots Our Forest, Pulitzer Outreach Project for the Mekong Region – curation of a show in BACC, Bangkok Arts and Cultural Center (November, 2022)
# The eloquence of the sound made when a chain reaction is broken – upcycled art with trash collected from Mekong river (September, 2022)
# What’s Your Gold – art therapy project and fundraising exhibition with survivors of sex trafficking (August, 2022)
# Life Will Win – fundraising exhibition for humanitarian aid in Ukraine (June, 2022)
# Through the lights and the smoke and the screens – video installation with Cambodian contemporary dancer Nget Rady, as part of S.E.L.F. introspective art experience (February 2022)
# MHOPe – art direction for a collaborative media project on food systems in Cambodia and series of videos ‘Food with stories inside’ (February 2022)
# Sahaka Playground – photos painted by other artists as part of ASEM Cultural Festival, Asia-Europe Summit, Cambodia National Museum (November 2021)
# A new kind of nature? (Vol2 Luxury Creatures) – Bronze prize at Craft City Lab competition in Cheongju International Craft Biennale, South Korea (September 2021)
# Oblivion, as part of Loei Art Fes – photo-sound installation in Thailand (August 2021)
# PenhArt2021, Cambodia Contemporary Art Fair – as invited curator, organization and the sound installation ‘Home’ (June 2021)
# From Disability to Visibility – curation of more than 20 artists and 14 NGOs (February, 2021)
# Coming Back – photos for an online exhibition by IOM/U.N. Migration (December, 2020)
# EDJAI, in collaboration with HBS Foundation, including the launch of the publication Plastic Atlas (January, 2020)
# Joss Vines street art installation, part of Microgalleries’ Disrupting Climate Disruption: a Global Day of Action – BKK3 area in Phnom Penh
# The city is a playground, photos, paintings and AR (w/ Flori Green, Eric Gu) – Plantation Hotel, PP (June, 2018)
# From roots to eternity, desire to clouds – Intercontinental Hotel PP (January, 2018)
# I AM THE FIVE, 365 community portraits to mark one year of pre-trial detention of 5 human rights activists – The Mansion, Phnom Penh (May, 2017)
# People with stories inside & In search of the imperfect – Kampot Readers and Writers Festival (November, 2016)
# Is there a possibility of digital Lomo? – Battambang Digital Arts Festival (July, 2016)

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I also write some random thoughts in this network of stories growing in all directions about nature, art, deep ecology and indigenous ways of seeing+being. Rambling Rhizome.

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Cv in longer (and more boring) form…

Miguel Jerónimo studied robotics and emotions in artificial intelligence, namely its connection with music and painting for the creation of an intermedia instrument that composes music and abstract paintings in real-time with the sounds and colors created according to emotions expressed by the body language of the performer.

He co-created and worked in some non-profit organizations and projects like Sapana, Sinergi, Emscan, Startup Pirates Lisboa, Aiesec’s Make it Possible and TEDxEdges.

Due to the work for one of the NGOs he created, he lived in rural India for two years to work with low-caste tribal communities in empowerment projects, building homes, co-starting a handicraft project, designing the concept of an eco-tourism and appropriate technologies center, etc.

He is a long-time traveler applying an extreme low-cost backpacking in order to mingle with local communities, including sleeping in local family homes or on the street. He hitchhiked around Asia for one and half years to write, photograph and study philosophy for himself,  having wandered through nine countries on a total of 18.121 kms hitchhiked on 322 different rides. He believes in continuous self-transformation and the figure of the vagabond as someone who travels to come back different.

He’s currently based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, engaging himself in different collaborations with other artists, freelancing in photography and writing, organizing art exhibitions and previously being an modern art lecturer part-time in local colleges.

His past projects:

• Co-founder & field coordinator ~ Sapana Portugal and India, an international non-profit organization focused on the empowerment of underprivileged communities (2011-2014)
• Co-founder & synergetic director ~ Sinergi, a non-profit online platform based on sharing economy to support NGOs (2011-2014)
• Creator of AffectiveWall, an intermedia instrument that translates the performer’s body language emotional expression into music and digital painting in real-time (based on a master thesis from a robotic’s degree at IST/Tecnico Lisbon with a final grade of 19 out of 20)
• Co-founder pirate at Startup Pirates Lisboa, one of the first chapters of a brand of entrepreneurship courses that spread around the globe (2011-2012)
• Co-founder and director at Emscan, an electroacoustic/experimental music association (2010-2012)
• External relations at Make !t Possible, an international youth awareness project (2011-2012) from Aiesec, a global student organization (2010-2012)
• Others (between 2007 and 2011): spaces dynamizer at the organizing team of TEDxEdges, real-time video manipulation at Feras Amestradas experimental theatre play, experimental musician at Nome Generico, production at DME Electroacoustic Music Festival, president at CinemaparaIST movie club.

Other links:
youtube.com/user/mljeronimovideos/videos
vagabundagensorientais.wordpress.com (personal blog, written in portuguese)

[Photo above by Malin Annie Jansson]