memory in our genes | history on our skin

Commissioned Art by Mahala Urra

The recent uproar over the exploitation of a tribal elder at the recent Manila FAME event has opened a whole can of worms. 

Read a BBC article on it - one of many that have since gone viral. 

Apo Whang Od Oggay herself may well disagree. 

Sleeping figure is celebrated Kalinga tatoo artist, Apo Whang Od

#MeToo

Caught between a rock and a hard place.

On the upside we all rejoice over the whistle blowers who finally toppled Harvey Weinstein.

Predators and perverts like him have no place in our world or the future of our children.

Yet bigger fish like self professed pussy grabbing Donald Trump and forever rape boasting Rodrigo Duterte are presidents of nations.

Even when someone like Bill Cosby gets to court his sexual assault cases end in a mistrial.

war torn interiors

PBS just aired Ken Burns' film "The Vietnam War" - a ten-part, 18-hour documentary series co-directed with Lynn Novick.

Featuring testimony from nearly 100 witnesses in an immersive 360-degree narrative telling the epic story of the Vietnam War in all its heart breaking folly.

As a freshly enrolled college student in the mid-70s we had the double whammy of the war abroad and the Marcos declared martial law back home in the Philippines.

for the love of Joni | then & now

Reading a tender homage to Joni Mitchell in the New Yorker magazine due this October 7. Capturing the images and drama perfectly - of life then and the trajectories that lead it here.

I had just moved to the big city, enrolled at the state university - martial law was so new and not as impactful as living on my own for the first time. 

It was a year of many firsts for me.