The Knowledge Production and Circulation component of PCAN identifies research themes and topics pertinent to the vision of the proposed network. For its pilot research project, it undertakes archival research on Philippine artists Jess Ayco (1916-1982), Santiago Bose (1949-2002), Abdulmari Imao (1936-2014), and Junyee (Luis Yee Jr) (born 1942). Born or based in the regions of Bacolod, Baguio, Jolo, and Los Baños, the artists represent the disparate conditions and production in Philippine modern and contemporary art. Their artistic practices have since been translated beyond province and nation, decentering the national and global privileges of Manila and the west, and altogether broadening the scope of locality.
The pilot research project offers timelines and historiographies of the aforementioned artists based on annotated bibliographies of extensive compilations of primary sources and a meta-critique of historical surveys. In mapping and retracing their places in the master narrative of Philippine art, the project reflects on the constructed notions of “region” and the “contemporary” and the former’s presence in the latter.



