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Anting anting means mystical or sacred power imbued in an object, place, or person. This project, Anting Anting Soul Dance, reflects on objects from the Asian Art Museum’s Philippine and Filipino American collection, selected by lead artist Alleluia Panis with museum staff. Panis and her collaborators will reach out to guest experts to conduct discussions, interviews, and movement workshops that explore the community’s connection to those objects.  The project partners ask: “How do objects from the Asian Art Museum’s Philippine Art collection relate to a community’s colonized history?; What power do these objects represent?; How does one create ceremony when the practice has been erased or replaced from collective memory?”

Informed by their investigation, Panis will create a new, multidisciplinary, ritual performance with composer Josh Icban and new media artist Wilfred Galila that is rooted in Pilipinx futurism.

Lead artist Alleluia Panis creates movement-based works weaving together her training in modern Western dance, Pilipinx warrior arts, and a decades-long study in indigenous cultural ceremony.

The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco is recognized and respected throughout the world as a leading art institution and is one of the largest museums in the United States devoted exclusively to Asian art. Its collection comprises more than 18,000 objects spanning 6,000 years. Through its “Re-History Project,” the Museum is questioning the unequal power systems that support the collecting of cultural antiquities in museums globally, including its own collection. This project contributes to that inquiry.

Photo of Alleluia Panis by Joe Ramos