China and the Philippines have long been trading partners as evidenced by relics from the Ming Dynasty which have been found even in a relatively far-off places from the empire like the Huluga site of Cagayan de Oro’s first settlement, so it’s not strange to find cultural links between the Chinese and Filipino peoples even today, the territorial issues over some islands notwithstanding.
Kagay-anon Performance Artist Nic Aca in China (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
One of Cagayan de Oro’s foremost performance artists recently had the enviable experience to spend some two weeks with his peers in a rural area of China.
“The Asian Village Project, Latent Action, was an overwhelming experience for me as a participating artist. It brought me to an opportunity of sharing my performances and meeting new people from different cultures,” said Nicolas Aca, Jr., resident artist and gallery curator, of Capitol University’s Museum of Three Cultures in Cagayan de Oro City, Philippines.
Longting Village in Heyang County, Weinan City, Shanxi Province is a microcosm of rural society in Guanzhong Plain, the birthplace of China’s agricultural society. This area is the repository of thousands of years of Chinese rural civilization which is being eroded by the combined weathering of growing urbanization and capitalism.
China’s traditional Confucian moral and political mores are crumbling under the stress of physical and natural ethics, and the value of individual existence is fast being forgotten.
Nic Aca with fellow artists of the Asian Village Project visit an ancient historical site in China (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
“The whole village project was full of discovery and learning,” said Aca, who is recognized as Cagayan de Oro’s foremost performance artist.“It shaped and emphasized the process of approaching modern urbanization.”
According to the project brochure provided by the organizers, “rural society has become its own grave-digger facing the expansion and suffocating control of the city, the monster.”
The sudden changes brought by survival and conflict is the focus artists from all over Asia were faced with when they joined the month long performing arts workshop at the Latent Action Performance Art Institute last August 2016.
Wang Chuyu, one of the project executors (with Qiao Shengxu and Liu Nanxi) and founder of the Latent Action Performance Art Institute in April 2016 briefly describes Latent Action – The Asian Village Project:
“Agriculture has been the mainstay of society for millions of years. Asia embarked on a sudden shift to urbanization after the rise of the modern Western civilization. This is a major turning-point for Asian Culture. Precisely under this cultural and political context, this project starts as the Asian performance artists’ movement on village research.”
Concept – Response to the Latent Action of the Asian Village Project (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
In the values discourse of “modern civilization”, “Village” is described as the alien “other”, the “obverse” of modernization and “underdeveloped areas”.
Undoubtedly, this discourse shaped and stressed how the process of imminent modern urbanization and civilization actually is the disappearance of the “village”.
Village, being transformed, defined and occupied by “modern civilization”, has been declining and vanishing; during which, mountains and rivers, the natural cycle of production, morality and politics of world ethics, are being threatened with extinction by the violence of modernity.
Village is reduced into fragments struggling in its last gasp under the rapacious attacks and pillaging of capitalism’s unquenchable greed. Village has degenerated into a world willfully manipulated by modern discourse: the whole history of colonized Asia is the memory of the shattering and death of the village, which is utterly rotted in the narrative of modern aesthetics, with one foot on the road leading to museums where they will remain mere memories in people’s minds.
“One day, if humans find themselves with no path to follow amidst the crowded highways, would village still exist when we look back? Would it be possible to regenerate village? Where could a person dwell peacefully in a rustic setting? What kind of sound and concept can be conveyed when art intervenes into village? How can art practice in Asian villages extend our thoughts? This would be the questions and thinking path that we will face and deal with during this village project,” Wang writes.
Within this context, “Latent Action” Performance Art Institute initiated this Asian Village Project.
This project, as part of the “Latent Action” Asian Performance Art Project, collaborated with performance art organizations and institutes in Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Taiwan and Philippines.
Nic Aca socializing with fellow artists of the Asian Village Project during a recent visit in China (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
“Within two weeks of my stay, I was beyond happy to experience the great hospitality of the people in Longting Village,” shared Aca.“We were well accommodated and immersed in the area. It was a heart-warming experience to see how their culture works and moves.”
Latent Action Performance Art Institute was founded by Wang Chuyu and Qiao Shengxu in April 2016, and was previously known as the GUYU Action Performance Art Organization.
From October 18-31, Aca joined other participating artists in a residency program, among them: Banpo (Beijing, China), Dennis Tan (Singapore), Hu Yanzi (Chongqing, China), Jeremiah Hiah (Singapore), Mohamad Haryo Hotomo (Indonesia), Auyeung Tung (Hong Kong), Qiao Shengxu (Hong Kong), Vichukoru Tangpaiboon (Thailand). Watan Uma (Taiwan), and Wang Chuyu (Beijing, China). He was the only Filipino artist selected for the program.
“Together with other Asian artists, all of us were given the chance to perform, but unfortunately not all chose to join the residency program.
On October 24, Aca conducted a solo performance at Longting Village where he performed his Convergence.
Concept – Convergence of Asian Countries (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
“My performance, Convergence, conceptualizes the need of Asian countries to congregate and come together to improve bonds between participating artists. It also aims to reach out, appreciate, understand, and value each other’s cultural differences.”
Convergence was held in an abandoned railway station, dysfunctional and useless, reflecting the concept of the performance in putting together Asian countries to bring their thoughts together, and thus help in possibly regenerating the village.
“With the help of Singaporean artist Jeremy Hiah, it was a whole lot easier to understand the Chinese language and it enabled me to communicate with other artists and the people at the village,” Aca said.
Residents of Longting Village enjoying Nic Aca’s one man photo exhibit (Photo credits: Latent Action Performance Art Institute)
In a tribute to Aca’s performance, the officials of Longting Village requested him to bequeath his photo exhibit to its future generations where it will be exhibited in the village’s hall for them to ponder upon.
Indeed, a simple tribute to a great artist that generations will long remember.
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