Almost 10 years ago, I used to perform my poetry, what many know as "spoken word". I was in a Filipino American artist collective called Balagtasan Collective and we were a group of artists in Los Angeles that created art as a tool for social change. Not only were we artists but we were also community organizers. We would write pieces with political messages and we would perform them in front of hundreds of people from festivals to anti-war rallies. That was at one point the core of my creativity and is still the core reason why I am an artist.
Yet, it's been years since I've created pieces, written poetry, and created art work to really make people think about their reality and the larger issues that plague this world. Looking at these pictures brings me back to those times and hopefully offers me the inspiration to reconnect to that place again and create work to demonstrate my personal evolution and perspective of the world today.
