Through Asian American Virtual Histories, artist Kristian Kabuay, in partnership with Kearny Street Workshop, has been exploring stories of Pilipinx arts activism and social history in the South of Market neighborhood of San Francisco. Interviews with three Pilipinx community and arts leaders are being animated over a 360 degree view. Audiences will be able to enter the stories through scanning QR codes installed at pertinent sites in the neighborhood or through an online map.
The Creative Work Fund is supporting an expansion of these Virtual Histories to include stories from San Francisco’s Chinatown, including Kearny Street Workshop’s involvement in the fight to save the International Hotel in the 1970s. Also partnering in this evolving Virtual Reality work are Kearny Street Workshop’s Artistic Director Jason Bayani, Balay Kreative, and Chinatown-based artist Kayan Cheung-Miaw.
Kristian Kabuay is a leading scholar of pre- and post-Pilipinx culture in diaspora. He is notorious for breaking from traditional craft to hone his sensibilities in street art and to make advances in applying augmented reality and projection mapping to traditional narratives and aesthetics.
Kearny Street Workshop’s mission is to produce, present, and promote art that empowers Asian Pacific Americans (APAs). It envisions a more just society that makes art more accessible to broad audiences, while fully incorporating APA voices. It has been a creative hub at the juncture of art and social justice since its founding in 1972.
Screen shot image by Kristian Kabuay