#mo_space

More openings! Here’s one from last Saturday. This is becoming a dangerous habit!

Miracle Healing and Other Hopeful Things is a one-man show by Poklong Anading at mo_. which opened last Saturday. The entire space was turned into a landscape of found rags (basahan) from all over the city reconstructed into various pieces and deconstructed into scraps that carpeted the exhibition space. At one corner a video on loop showed photographs of individual rags collected and used for the show.

These rags were collected from the odds and ends of the city: in garbage cans, gutters, gas stations and alleys. With the use of these found objects, several things were brought to my attention: firstly, that these were primarily a kind of waste from the city: discarded, dirty debris that in itself was made up of refuse, that is, bits of fabric sewn together. However, these were not simply rags or trash but also seem to serve some aesthetic, even decorative purpose. With the variety of colors and patterns that can be achieved, the ‘humble’ beginning of scrap from which the rag originates allows it to move up towards function and even beyond it.

In the same way, Anading uses these ‘leftovers’ and creates something distinctly beautiful. The entire exhibition begins to look like an entirely different, but familiar, scene.  From the discards emerges impressions of life and movement, sprouting from equally discarded truck tires and paint cans. Looking at it this way and more so in the context of the Philippines today, I find again both hope and healing.