MAKATI, PHILIPPINES – Bellas Artes Projects (BAP) proudly presents MISS, a work-in-progress by dancer and performer Josh Serafin (Philippines/Belgium), which unpacks codes of representation and performativity found in the established world of transgender beauty pageantry in the Philippines, and looks closer into the rigor and choreography in subculture and rural pageantry; where queerness explodes fixed categorization of femininity and fantasy.
Serafin traveled to Cebu City and Bacolod City to research the history and meet with organizers of Queen Philippines 2019 – the grandest beauty pageant for transgender women in the country – and Linay Sang Negros, respectively. Interviews and movement training with past winners and contestants informs and serves as inspiration for Miss, a one-hour long performance that pushes the boundaries of femininity, sex and gender.
Special thanks to Eljay Ricafranca Villafuerte a.k.a. Ms. Tornado Walk, Siege Sytancgco, and Cary Santiago.
Josh Serafin’s BAP residency is supported by Mercedes Zobel.
The performance will take place on Wednesday, September 11th at 8pm at BAP Outpost, 2/F The Alley at Karrivin 2316 Chino Roces Avenue, Makati. The event is free and open to the public.
For inquiries and more information, please contact press@bellasartesprojects.org or (02) 817-2205.
About Josh Serafin
Josh Serafin is a graduating fellow of P.A.R.T.S.; a leading contemporary dance academy based in Brussels, and alumnus of the Philippine High School for the Arts where he majored in Theatre Arts. He also studied at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, majoring in Contemporary Dance, and has performed extensively in several platforms throughout Asia and Europe, in collaboration with different choreographers and artists including: Arco Renz, Eisa Jocson, Manuel Pelmus, Bruno Isacovic, Ming Wong, Choy Ka Fai, and Leeroy New among others. He has performed in Queer Zagred in Croatia, Bouge B Festival in de Singel Antwerp, Centre National de la Danse in Paris, and Dansand festival in Ostende.
His work currently deals with questions about identity, states of being, ways of inhabiting the body, and the inherent duality that manifest in physical form and what it represents, taking inspiration from the current conditions, culture, systems and environments where he currently exist in.
And an alter identity he has created called “Void.”
