[3] He then started working at the Royal University of Fine Arts in Phnom Penh where he founded the Khmer Folklore Troupe in 1964 in order to fight against what he considered "rampant pessimism" in the field of culture in Cambodia.
In 1973, he was named at the head of the National Conservatory of Spectacles of Cambodia, where he labored to save the art of Cambodian puppet theater by encouraging performers and collecting musical scores.
[6] He tried to develop an Artist Village intended to showcase the customs and traditions of Cambodia, through handicrafts, dance and music, but the idea fell short because of the war.
[10] In 1981, Chheng Phon was named director of the School of Fine Arts which he reopened in Phnom Penh,[11] as a place where he could gather the artists scattered across the country and train a new generation of dancers.
[19] On August 5, 1990, Chheng Phon submitted his resignation as Minister for Culture for health reasons, though some journalists have noted that the real cause may have been his proximity with Ung Phan of the FUNCINPEC royalist party which had just been ousted.
[24] On March 7, 1998, he signed a $25.8 million contract with a private company called Ciccone to stage the elections, and when criticized for his actions, he assumed his responsibility, saying there were no other options.
Sending his condolences to the family, Prime Minister Hun Sen acknowledged him as a national hero saying: The death of this elderly man is the loss of a father, a grandfather of Brahmavihara and the loss of human resources, [who] took an important role in serving and developing the nation.Chheng Phon defended his efforts to rebuild the classical dance tradition by appealing to a sense of pride in a Cambodian "national aesthetic.
What we had 1,000 years ago we must make alive again.While he was very conservative on cultural issues, Chheng Phon was open to new creations, such as the 1999 version of Shakespeare's Othello which was blended into Khmer ballet by his niece Sophiline Shapiro whom he praised for her "communication between the west and the east".
He dedicated his life after the Civil War to the training of specialists who would devote themselves to the restoration of cultural property and was especially well known for assembling the artists and performers who survived the Khmer Rouge.