topic

Identities

"[I]nstead of thinking of identity as an already accomplished fact ... we should think, instead, of identity as a 'production', which is never complete, always in process, and always constituted within, not outside, representation" (p. 222). Stuart Hall’s injunction, from “Cultural Identity and Diaspora" (1990), asks us to consider the many, frequently disparate forces that shape individual identities.


As these works reveal, identity is never singular and frequently at odds with itself and its surroundings, a moment to moment creation that only partially captures the complexity of the whole. National origin and citizenship, migration, language, race, work status, gender, access to legal resources, class affiliation, “talents,” historical background, profession: these factors all collide to form overlapping selves, constituted in daily acts of self-representation.


As Filipinos move through global circuits of home, migration, and labor, they must negotiate not only their own sense of identity as "Filipino"; they must also contend with others’ projections, drawn from years of (mis)representation: that Filipinas are sexually perverse, that Filipino men are effeminate, that Filipinos are “natural” caretakers, that the Philippines is a “slave nation,” that Filipinos are punny. The works here examine the process, the complexity, the ambivalences, and the ambiguities through which Filipino identity comes to exist in the world.

You Make a Half of Me

Kenji C. Liu

2016 Digital video recording Duration: 1m 29s Courtesy of the artist

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Kenji C. Liu

b. 1977

Born in Japan to a Japanese mother and Taiwanese father, the laws at the time excluded me from Japanese citizenship. Because of my father, I was an alien and a ward of the Republic of China, a place I had never seen. Ironic, considering that my father was born into the Japanese Empire. This legal twist, among several others I have explored in my poetry collection Map of an Onion, is a major crux in my creative and scholarly practice.

I am interested in the documents of the state, or what documentation does or does not permit. By document I mean anything from citizenship or residence papers to federal laws or medical examinations. How does a document, or a series of documents, create a certain kind of person, a certain kind of body?

Simultaneously, my experiential practice as a vipassana meditator provides a different yet compatible perspective on personhood and embodiment—that ultimately, what we take to be natural or solid are neither. That what we consider to be a solid self is an amalgamated series of reactions to our experiences.

My current work is the decolonial exploration of an intersection—between the formation of a legal subject (by legal I don’t mean a person given legitimacy through law, but rather a type of person defined and created by law, whether citizen, resident, alien, undocumented, gender, race, etc.) and the formation of our sense of solid self, forged through very personal yet also social, political, economic experiences.

In this work I draw heavily on post-structural and post-colonial scholarship, attempting to sense into biopolitics and governmentality as they are deployed, as we deploy them, as deployment occurs. Equally important are Theravadan Buddhist suttas explicating the ways we form a sense of self (dependent origination or paticcasamuppada), the Four Noble Truths, and the cessation of dukkha. Together, these bodies of thought provide a view into not only how the self is made, but also how it can be remade or unmade—an essential insight for the practice of decolonization.

My poetry collection Map of an Onion is national winner of the 2015 Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize. My poetry is in many places, including American Poetry Review, Action Yes!, Split This Rock’s poem of the week series, four anthologies, and a chapbook, You Left Without Your Shoes. I have received fellowships from Kundiman, VONA/Voices, Djerassi, and the Community of Writers, and hold an MA in Cultural Anthropology and Social Transformation.

Photo credit: Margarita Corporan

 

location

X
  • Born: Kyoto, Japan
  • Based: Los Angeles, CA, USA
  • Also Based in: Oakland, CA, USA

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You Make a Half of Me (screen capture)

Kenji C. Liu

2016 Screen capture of video performance Courtesy of the artist

contributor

X

Kenji C. Liu

b. 1977

Born in Japan to a Japanese mother and Taiwanese father, the laws at the time excluded me from Japanese citizenship. Because of my father, I was an alien and a ward of the Republic of China, a place I had never seen. Ironic, considering that my father was born into the Japanese Empire. This legal twist, among several others I have explored in my poetry collection Map of an Onion, is a major crux in my creative and scholarly practice.

I am interested in the documents of the state, or what documentation does or does not permit. By document I mean anything from citizenship or residence papers to federal laws or medical examinations. How does a document, or a series of documents, create a certain kind of person, a certain kind of body?

Simultaneously, my experiential practice as a vipassana meditator provides a different yet compatible perspective on personhood and embodiment—that ultimately, what we take to be natural or solid are neither. That what we consider to be a solid self is an amalgamated series of reactions to our experiences.

My current work is the decolonial exploration of an intersection—between the formation of a legal subject (by legal I don’t mean a person given legitimacy through law, but rather a type of person defined and created by law, whether citizen, resident, alien, undocumented, gender, race, etc.) and the formation of our sense of solid self, forged through very personal yet also social, political, economic experiences.

In this work I draw heavily on post-structural and post-colonial scholarship, attempting to sense into biopolitics and governmentality as they are deployed, as we deploy them, as deployment occurs. Equally important are Theravadan Buddhist suttas explicating the ways we form a sense of self (dependent origination or paticcasamuppada), the Four Noble Truths, and the cessation of dukkha. Together, these bodies of thought provide a view into not only how the self is made, but also how it can be remade or unmade—an essential insight for the practice of decolonization.

My poetry collection Map of an Onion is national winner of the 2015 Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize. My poetry is in many places, including American Poetry Review, Action Yes!, Split This Rock’s poem of the week series, four anthologies, and a chapbook, You Left Without Your Shoes. I have received fellowships from Kundiman, VONA/Voices, Djerassi, and the Community of Writers, and hold an MA in Cultural Anthropology and Social Transformation.

Photo credit: Margarita Corporan

 

location

X
  • Born: Kyoto, Japan
  • Based: Los Angeles, CA, USA
  • Also Based in: Oakland, CA, USA

comments

X

The Young

Angela Peñaredondo

2016 Digital video recording Duration: 2m 38s Courtesy of the artist

contributor

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Angela Peñaredondo

b. 1979

Born in Iloilo City, Philippines, Angela Peñaredondo is a Pilipinx poet and artist (on other days, she identifies as a usual ghost, subdued comet, or part-time animal). Her first full-length book, All Things Lose Thousands of Times (Inlandia Institute, 2016) is the winner of the Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize. She is the author of a chapbook, Maroon (Jamii Publications, 2015). Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in AAWW’s The Margins, Four Way Review, Cream City Review, Southern Humanities Review, South Dakota Review, Dusie and elsewhere. She is a VONA/Voices of our Nations Art fellow as well as a recipient of a University of California Institute for Research in the Arts Grant, the Gluck Program of the Arts Fellowship, Naropa University’s Zora Neal Hurston Award, Squaw Valley Writers Fellowship, and Fishtrap Fellowship. She has received scholarships from Tin House, Split This Rock, Dzanc Books' International Literary Program, and others.

location

X
  • Born: Iloilo City, Philippines
  • Based: Southern California, CA, USA

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The Young (screen capture)

Angela Peñaredondo

2016 Screen capture of video performance Courtesy of the artist.

contributor

X

Angela Peñaredondo

b. 1979

Born in Iloilo City, Philippines, Angela Peñaredondo is a Pilipinx poet and artist (on other days, she identifies as a usual ghost, subdued comet, or part-time animal). Her first full-length book, All Things Lose Thousands of Times (Inlandia Institute, 2016) is the winner of the Hillary Gravendyk Poetry Prize. She is the author of a chapbook, Maroon (Jamii Publications, 2015). Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in AAWW’s The Margins, Four Way Review, Cream City Review, Southern Humanities Review, South Dakota Review, Dusie and elsewhere. She is a VONA/Voices of our Nations Art fellow as well as a recipient of a University of California Institute for Research in the Arts Grant, the Gluck Program of the Arts Fellowship, Naropa University’s Zora Neal Hurston Award, Squaw Valley Writers Fellowship, and Fishtrap Fellowship. She has received scholarships from Tin House, Split This Rock, Dzanc Books' International Literary Program, and others.

location

X
  • Born: Iloilo City, Philippines
  • Based: Southern California, CA, USA

comments

X

Four on the Floor

Jason Bayani

2016 Digital video recording Duration: 3m 33s Courtesy of the artist

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Jason Bayani

b. 1976
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Jason Bayani is a graduate of Saint Mary’s M.F.A. program in Creative Writing. He is a Kundiman fellow and a veteran of the National Poetry Slam scene, and his work has been published in Fourteen Hills, Muzzle Magazine, Mascara Review, the National Poetry Slam anthology, Rattapallax, Write Bloody’s classroom anthology–– Learn Then Burn—and other publications. As a member of seven National Poetry Slam teams, he’s been a National Poetry Slam finalist and represented Oakland at the International World Poetry Slam. He is also one of the founding members of the Filipino American Spoken Word troupe, Proletariat Bronze, and has been an organizer for the Asian and Pacific Islander Poetry and Spoken Word Summit. His first book, Amulet, was published in 2013 through Write Bloody Press and has garnered acclaim in literary magazines such as Zyzzyva and Glint. He is currently the program manager for Kearny Street Workshop, the oldest multi-disciplinary Asian Pacific American multi-disciplinary arts organization in the country.

Photo credit: Maragrita Corporan

location

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  • Born: San Francisco, CA, USA
  • Based: San Francisco, CA, USA

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Four on the Floor (screen capture)

Jason Bayani

2016 Screen capture of video performance Courtesy of the artist

contributor

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Jason Bayani

b. 1976
image description
  • See All Works
  • facebook
  • visit website

Jason Bayani is a graduate of Saint Mary’s M.F.A. program in Creative Writing. He is a Kundiman fellow and a veteran of the National Poetry Slam scene, and his work has been published in Fourteen Hills, Muzzle Magazine, Mascara Review, the National Poetry Slam anthology, Rattapallax, Write Bloody’s classroom anthology–– Learn Then Burn—and other publications. As a member of seven National Poetry Slam teams, he’s been a National Poetry Slam finalist and represented Oakland at the International World Poetry Slam. He is also one of the founding members of the Filipino American Spoken Word troupe, Proletariat Bronze, and has been an organizer for the Asian and Pacific Islander Poetry and Spoken Word Summit. His first book, Amulet, was published in 2013 through Write Bloody Press and has garnered acclaim in literary magazines such as Zyzzyva and Glint. He is currently the program manager for Kearny Street Workshop, the oldest multi-disciplinary Asian Pacific American multi-disciplinary arts organization in the country.

Photo credit: Maragrita Corporan

location

X
  • Born: San Francisco, CA, USA
  • Based: San Francisco, CA, USA

comments

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Myselves

Do Ho Suh

2013 Thread, cotton, methylcellulose 101.6 cm. x 76.2 cm © Do Ho Suh, Courtesy of the Artist and Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York and Hong Kong

contributor

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Do Ho Suh

b. 1962

Do Ho Suh is an internationally renowned Korean artist. Suh constructs site-specific installations and meticulously crafted sculptures that question boundaries of identity, conventional notions of scale, and space in both its physical and metaphorical manifestation.

Suh studied oriental painting at Seoul National University in the 1980s, and in 1991 he moved to the United States to study painting at the Rhode Island School of Design and sculpture at Yale University School of Art. He settled in New York in 1997, where he lived and worked until relocating to London in 2010. He currently maintains studios in London, Seoul, and New York.

Suh represented South Korea at the 49th Venice Biennale in 2001 with his iconic work Some/One, constructed of military dog tags exploring individual and collective identity. Solo exhibitions of his work have been presented internationally, including at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris, New York, 2001; Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, 2002; Serpentine Gallery, London, 2002; Artsonje Center, Seoul, 2003; the Fabric Workshop and Museum, Philadelphia, 2005; Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York, 2010; DAAD Galerie, Berlin, 2011; Singapore Tyler Print Institute, Singapore, 2011; Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, 2012; Hiroshima City Museum of Contemporary Art, Hiroshima, 2012; 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, 2012–13; National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Seoul, 2013; The Contemporary Austin, Austin, 2014; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Cleveland, Ohio, 2015.

Suh’s work has been prominently featured in major group exhibitions and biennials worldwide, including the Istanbul Biennial, Turkey, 2003; Psycho Buildings, Hayward Gallery, London, 2008; Your Bright Future, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, and Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2009; Liverpool Biennial, 2010; Venice Architecture Biennale, 2010; Gwangju Biennale, 2012; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 2013; Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing, 2014; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2015; and Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, 2015. His work is included in numerous museum collections worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; Tate Modern, London; Leeum Samsung Museum, Seoul; Artsonje Center, Seoul; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; Mori Art Museum, Tokyo; and the 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, among many others.

location

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  • Born: Seoul, South Korea
  • Based: London, England, UK

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Sayaw

Francis Estrada

2010 Charcoal on paper 18" x 24" Courtesy of the artist

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Francis Estrada

b. 1975

Born in the Philipines and currently residing in Brooklyn, Francis Estrada is a visual artist, museum educator at the Museum of Modern Art, and freelance educator of Filipino art and culture. Francis has a fine arts degree in painting and drawing from San Jose State University, and he has taught in a variety of studio, classroom, and museum settings to diverse audiences, including programs for adults with disabilities, cultural institutions, and after-school programs. He was also an administrator and educator at the Museum for African Art, where he enjoyed teaching about the amalgamation of art and culture through objects. Francis exhibits his work nationally, including online publications. His work focuses on culture, history, and perception.

I investigate relationships between characters and their environment. I incorporate pieces of personal, historic and/or ethnographic photographs, text, and motifs (most of which broach the combined themes of history, sentimentality, and nostalgia).  Using some or all of these pieces, I compose scenarios with which I find personal connections then arrange them without providing a complete image or narrative. By de-contextualizing visual images (figures, symbols, motifs) from their original source, I attempt to create an ambiguous space for the viewer to complete. I interrogate how context is created through combinations of these visual elements.  How does the viewer identify with the images presented, and does the composition create a narrative?  How do the combinations of images create notions of space, place, history, identity, or memory?  By creating drawings that assimilate text, photographic reproductions, and symbols, I provide the viewer with a space in which they can decipher the visual clues and “complete” the work.

My art is a tool through which I confront how our understandings of culture are mediated, and the methods through which history and memory are created and perpetuated. I think of my work as "partial portraits" that are activated by the viewer.

I believe that my work speaks to the theme of Storm: A Typhoon Haiyan Recovery Project by connecting to how the media represented the country through images from the aftermath of the storm.  Also, various fundraising events brought out a vast array of artists and performers who used their talent to share Filipino customs (dance, song, martial arts).  Between the media and these events, people were able to see and experience various aspects of Filipino culture.  I feel that my drawings similarly portray various aspects of Philippine culture through the images that I choose to show. 

location

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  • Born: Manila, Philippines
  • Based: Brooklyn, NY, USA

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Tulips Teeth (Drawing 1)

Farsad Labbauf

2007 Color pencil on paper. 20 in. x 16 in. Courtesy of the artist.

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Farsad Labbauf

b. 1965

Farsad Labbauf (Persian: فرساد لباف ) is an Iranian artist living and working in the New York area. Best known for his linear figurative paintings, he immigrated to the US at thirteen. After enrolling in Rhode Island School of Design in 1982, Labbauf received his Bachelor of Fine Arts, followed by a second degree in Industrial Design. His linear figurative paintings are inspired in part by Persian calligraphy, tile works, and studies in Quantum physics, revealing his reverence for such ideas as Unity and Monism. The origins of Labbauf's work lie in Figurative Expressionism, a style he practiced for more than two decades, leading to the creation of his linear figurative painting style. His paintings have been featured in more than sixty group shows across the globe, including at the Saatchi Gallery in London and Ex Aurum Museum in Pescara, Italy. He has, in addition, been the subject of solo exhibitions in New York, NY; Boston, MA; Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Tehran, Iran; and the Esfahan Museum of Contemporary Art, Iran. Labbauf's work can be found in numerous public and private collections, including the Salsali Museum, Dubai; the Saatchi Gallery, London; Carsten de Boer Art Collection, Amsterdam; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Esfahan.

 

Photograph by Linda Thompson. 

Over the past decade, the focus of my work has been directed on expressing ideas of singularity and exploring themes regarding the subject of Unity. Original inspirations for these ideas were found in studies of Rumi's poetry, Quantum physics and Monistic belief systems.

In addition to my figurative linear paintings, a second method of application also evolved simultaneously, using lines to overlap different content. Examining unrelated themes and conjuring new relationships, a labyrinth of lines were born by overlapping different subjects. Mrs. Heinz (2003) was a hybrid image of a Japanese geisha and a Ketchup bottle, weaving contemporary flavor to an allegory for taste and traditional customs of pleasure. Rabbit-Face (2003) was a cross between a man's head and a rabbit, referencing a merge between the intellect and the beast inside. These works were followed by the Tulips-Teeth series (2007) and The Golden Rule (2012) which continued to explore a mélange of content, examining connections among iconic figures and such themes as nature, beauty, and decay.

To express and manifest ideas of singularity, different mediums and a variety of contents are continually explored. Irrespective of content, however, my work is a continual meditation on what lies beneath the form: a universe within which subject and object merge into one. A place where there is no separation between the teacher and the thought, away from duality and into the subterranean landscape of union. Even though sources for most of my content are external, my work is often an attempt for the union of the internal.

location

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  • Born: Tehran, Iran
  • Based: New York, NY, USA

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