"Hand-making
modernism and the commodities that accompany late capitalism
is at once an homage and a critique. An homage in that I do
enjoy rarified aesthetics and have a not-so-secret appreciation
for shopping, fashion, and consumerism. I am not beyond or above
these things—I am directly implicated in its cycle. I
would like to think my work addresses reclamation as well—claiming
the agency to partake of a rarified aesthetic dialogue and the
power to metaphorically (if not economically) participate in
capitalism, in an attempt to change both at some level.
"Within
the Philippines, the black market flow of goods is found in
the explosively profitable selling of bootleg CDs and DVDs.
That the culture machine of America has spawned what it considers
a healthy market desire overseas for its products (music and
movies), but is married to an unholy means of acquiring it (bootlegs),
is an example of an “illicit” form of capitalism
in action. Untaxed and unlicensed, these bootlegs straddle the
strange position of being a conveyer of Western cultural icons
and values to the developing world, while at the same time sidestepping
the conventional flow of profit to the multinationals. Filipinos,
according to a popular saying, are the world’s best mimics
and copiers—is the rampant spread of bootleg music and
movies within the Philippines simply a natural extension of
this logic? Is this form of “petty capitalism” a
resistant and ultimately subversive form of trade in opposition
to the macro capitalism of the transnational corporation?
"If
the art world has already come to terms with issues of postmodern
appropriations, it appears that transnational corporations have
yet to see the humor in their own products’ appropriation
overseas. Indeed, recent news coverage of the “threat”
of black market economies suggests that the readiness of the
American media to equate counterfeit goods with terrorism (Al
Qaeda) smacks of both fear-mongering and yet another way to
demonize the trade in goods that circumvent the “proper”
channels of capitalism. Capitalism, if interpreted in this manner,
works only when it enriches the “right” people and
is based on copyright rules established by certain countries
(mainly the US and Europe). In the case of Filipino piracy,
corporate capitalism and “free market” rules are
rewritten to serve not the upper levels of policy makers and
governments, but the individuals themselves who constitute the
growing global audience, essentially putting them at the forefront
of singly minor but cumulatively threatening challenges to consolidation
and control over capital..."