Eisa Jocson
(with The Filipino Superwoman Band)


Passion of Darna
2019


Mixed media installation consisting
of speaker horn, sound, and 
vinyl on wall
Variable Dimensions



Passion of Darna is a text and soundscape installation comprising one moment in the work of Jocson as part of The Filipino Superwoman Band. The work involves a Public Announcement speaker horn embellished to recall a disco ball that plays the titular Pasyon. The pasyon is a popular form of religious song that narrates the suffering of Jesus Christ, typically sung during Lent. In Jocson and The Filipino Superwoman Band’s recreation, the pasyon interweaves with the figure of Darna, the local counterpart of the female superheroine figure Superwoman by way of the 1980s ballad “Superwoman by African American R&B singer Karyn White, a Tagalog cover of which was popularized by Filipina singer Jenine Desiderio in the 1990s titled “Hindi ako si Darna (I am not Superwoman).” Sung by a female persona, the song narrates the everyday contexts of feminized labor within a domestic partnership. By superimposing the two texts and interweaving the Judeo- Christian ur-text with this popular ballad, the performance relocates the suffering of the canonical figure of Christianity within the intimacies of everyday feminized labor, the same labor that defines the currency of the Overseas Filipino Worker—majority of whom are employed as caretakers and domestic helpers—that has become a major driver of the economy of the Philippines. A series of blackout texts based on the lyrics of White’s song facet this narrative and open it to a number of perspectives through which feminized labor is foregrounded.












Eisa Jocson (b. 1986, Manila) is a contemporary choreographer and dancer from the Philippines. She was trained as a visual artist and has a background in ballet. Her works expose body politics in the service and entertainment industry as seen through the unique socioeconomic lens of the Philippines. She studies how the body moves and what conditions make it move—be it social mobility or movement out of Philippines through migrant work. In all her creations—from pole to macho dancing and hostess to Disney princess studies—capital is the driving force of movement pushing the indentured body into spatial geographies. Recent works, including the triptych Death of the Pole Dancer (2011), Macho Dancer (2013) and Host (2015); and the two-part series HAPPYLAND (2017), have been shown in a number of exhibitions and have been part of contemporary performance festivals. Macho Dancer won the prestigious Zurcher Kantonalbank Acknowledgement Prize at the Zurich Theater Spektakel in 2013. The work for this exhibition is part of The Filipino Superwoman Band, a series of performances and installations that look into the affective labor of Overseas Filipino Musicians, commissioned for the 2019 Sharjah Biennale. Jocson is a recipient of the Cultural Centre of the Philippines 13 Artists Award in 2018. She received the 2019 Hugo Boss Asia Art Award.