“Silent Malady,” 2017, Scanned and printed colonial images of the Philippines, inkjet prints of online news images, paint 9 x 24 x 1 feet
(scroll down for series description)
"Tainted Siege," 2017, Inkjet prints of American colonial photos of the Philippines and tourist postcards, mixed media, 12 x 7 x 1 fee
"Unsurpassed and Unsurpassable," 2018, Fabric, inkjet prints, paint, wood, 5 x 8 feet (each)
The title of the work is taken from the description of the sunset as recorded by Dean Worchester, in his colonial texts “The Philippines: Past and Present (1914).” There is about a 3 foot gap in between the sculptures, allowing the viewer to walk around and in between.
"Nostalgic Fatigue," 2017, Cut, dyed and painted colonial photographs of the Philippines (late 19th/early 20th century), 17 x 6 x 1 feet
Live performance at the Bronx Museum
“Maladies” is an ongoing series of hanging paper sculptures made out of American colonial text books from the early 20th century about the Philippines. I think of these hanging paper sculptures as transformed fragments of tropical landscapes, such as canopies and palm trees. In the early 20th century there was a transition of power from Spain to the US. Photos were used to promote ideals of American Empire and the “benevolent assimilation” of the Philippines. I am interested in using collage as a technique to rearrange mainstream narratives about “foreign” places. Bright colors such as red came from the question “What color would the landscape be if all histories, traumas, memories became visible?” I imagine these sculptures, these abstracted tropics, to not only absorb the past, but to also transform into powerful beings with agency that also signal power and danger.