BODABIL

BODABIL
(Vaudeville in the Vernacular)

by SANGVIAJE
Edrick Daniel * Dennis Fortozo * Joven Mansit
John Paul Antido * Jaypee Samson * Guerrero Habulan

Thursday 8th May 2008 7 pm
Utterly Art Exhibition Space
229A South Bridge Road (2nd Level) Singapore 058778

Mon-Sat 12 noon - 8 pm Sun 12 noon - 5.30 pm
The exhibition runs to Sunday 18th May 2008.


Bodabil, the colloquial term for vaudeville, consists of acts of assorted entertainments, brought by the Americans to the Philippines in the early 20th century. These acts of amusement were first brought in to entertain American soldiers. They entertained the native audience as well, shaping Filipino preferences for amusement that were inherently rooted in American culture and a circus of sorts. Far from its hey day, the remnants of bodabil continue to saturate contemporary Filipino society in degenerated forms—local girls in sexy costumes thrusting cheaply to the music in mass-oriented television shows; politicians out to woo votes through the movie stars singing and sashaying in their campaign trails; advertisements that are like song and dance routines and captivating to its audience. The term bodabil has now come to embody a circus of a variety show, a stage of acts, a farce, a travesty.

It is exactly this which Bodabil the exhibition seeks to explore. Attempting to locate the present day bodabils around them, each of the young artists of the group SANGVIAJE look into the gimmickry, trickery and spectacle pervading the current age. The artists rendered their individual ideas and observations of dissimulation in contemporary society, finding cohesion in the charades which perpetuate it.

In their use of the name "Sangviaje" (literally "one journey"), this young Antipolo-based artist collective are really referring to the multiplicity of expeditions in a single voyage, a singular physical trip as the mind trips on a host of cultural hallucinations—namely those painted for us by Jaypee Samson, Edrick Daniel, Dennis Fortozo, Guerrero Habulan, John Paul Antido, and Joven Mansit in this vigorous and youthful six-man show co-organized by Britania Art Projects.