A view of a young Khmer performer in Angkor by Loke Wan Tho

Born in 1915 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Loke Wan Tho was a prominent cinema magnate who founded Cathay Organization and the Cathay chain of cinemas in Singapore. Apart from his film business, Loke also had an avid interest in photography. He took a series of black and white photographs of the ancient Khmer city of Angkor in Cambodia. These pictures were eventually published in 1958 in a book entitled ‘Angkor’, which was authored by his good friend Malcolm MacDonald, the then Commissioner General of Singapore and Southeast Asia.