SINAWALI to Agos Y Viento

Sinawali Kamayan is a performance installation that serves as a cultural bridge, weaving together socially engaged dance theater, architecture, video art, food-sharing, and civic responsibility. This unique blend is a community practice of Kapwa, a deeply rooted Filipino concept that embodies a shared identity and fosters a culture of inclusiveness and interconnectedness. The event is hosted at the Arts + Culture Laboratory, a creative, multi-disciplinary space that intersects cultural preservation, music, design, and education in Houston, TX.

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The idea began during my first artist-in-residence at MECA (Multicultural Education and Counseling through the Arts) in 2021. While interacting with the Mexican dancers of MECA, I saw many similarities between our Philippine traditional dances and their folkloric dances. Furthermore, Alice Valdez (past director) suggested I explore the connections between Chicano and Filipino farm labor movements for my next work. This research idea was again suggested when I conducted field research with Indigenous groups from my island, Panay, when scholars urged me to explore Mexican pre-colonial ties to the Philippines.  Two years later, I met Carlos Castineira, a Mexican artist who was also investigating his Mexican roots. With my first-generation American daughter, Malaya Ulan, we invited Carlos into our practice of examining our ancestral memories and, simultaneously, finding each other’s deeply rooted connections.

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Carlos, Malaya, and I partake in various art modalities—movement, poetry, text, music, and sculptural design. This metaphorically speaks to our immigrant experience of constantly adapting, shapeshifting, and seeking commonalities rather than barriers. We have taken our immigration stories and interweaved our personal and political narratives into a 45-minute piece of multimodal storytelling. Reia’s singing, Alex Ramos' video installation, and dance participants from the Filipino community members of Houston, TX, enhance the piece. The work ends with a participatory “breaking of bread” merging Filipino and Mexican cuisine. 

 

The story is Filipino but shares ties in multiple ways with Mexican Culture. Filipinos and Mexicans have had this long-going cross-cultural dialogue from the Manila/Acapulco Galleon Trade to the Farm Labor Movements led by Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, Larry Itliong, Philip Vera-Cruz, and more. Sinawali Kamayan dismantles the notion that colonialism ties us together; instead, we reclaim the truth that our connection is deeply rooted in our indigene. This collaboration invites Filipinos and the Mexican community to reflect upon our connections as a continuum of our not-popularly-known solidarity.