Events

CHAIRPERSON

Assoc Prof Teresita Cruz-Del Rosario, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore

ABSTRACT

The seminar broadly outlines possible trajectories a study on Southeast Asian neighbourhoods may take. It considers three entwined processes (art practices and creative strategies, heritage advocacy and gentrification) that shape the formation of contingent and transient communities in the city. It begins by exploring spatial concepts that inform urban imaginaries (fringe, corridor, place/placeless-ness, to mention a few) to emphasise the gains from an interdisciplinary approach to studies of intersections between art and the city.

What are the emancipatory possibilities inherent in art to address the complexities of urban life? Does art, as we typically understand it given its breadth, necessarily coincide with creative strategies to do with place making? Is there a possibility for both to productively coincide or even collide with the aim of connecting one neighbourhood community to another, thus producing a mutual network of resources?

It cites Escolta as primary example, an area of the city in the early stages of gentrification and relates it to two other districts in Manila: Intramuros and Sta. Ana. These case studies anchor the presentation’s discussion of the various modes of engagement that shape the relationships between aforementioned processes. The niche afforded by creativity, by way of cultural industries or artistic practices will be examined in the context of these examples.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Tessa Maria Guazon’s research project centres on contemporary art practices in urban contexts with focus on the pragmatic possibilities inherent in art in shaping public life. She has published essays on the topic, most recent for a Routledge anthology on Asian cities and a Wiley Blackwell journal essay on urban research.

She has received fellowships for fieldwork in Southeast Asia: a SEASREP grant for Thai language studies in 2008 and an Asian Public Intellectuals Fellowship for research in Thailand and Indonesia in 2013-2014. Her current research on heritage and gentrification is funded by the University of the Philippines Diliman. She was attached as researcher to the National Gallery Singapore in 2011 and will be on a similar attachment to the Fukuoka Asian Art Museum Japan in 2017.

She teaches courses in art history, criticism, and public art at the University of the Philippines Diliman and has written and curated exhibitions of Philippine contemporary art. A forthcoming journal essay critiques an architecture exhibit that employs the survey as exhibitionary mode. She has degrees in design and art history from the University of the Philippines Diliman.

REGISTRATION

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