Isle of the Blessed

ISLE OF THE BLESSED

Duty-Free Paradise | Isle of the Blessed is a 40-minute theatrical performance in three parts, created in the form of a post-colonial Filipinx epic.

The name of the performance is taken from the Essay ‘Pandora’s Vox Redux’ by Carmen Hermosillo (humdoG):

“It is fashionable to suggest that cyberspace [or paradise] is some island of the blessed where people are free to indulge and express their individuality. This is not true. I have seen many people spill out their emotions, their guts online, and I did so myself until I began to see that I had commodified myself."

Isle of the blessed explores the contradictions between perceptions and realities of island life as a constructed paradise through American pop culture, down to the flora and fauna. It explores transmedia storytelling as a tool to visually create a dialogue around the eco-tourism in Hawai’i, and the many connections it has to biopolitics and militarism throughout American history intertwined with neoliberalism. It aims to create an anti-colonial perspective on the romanticization and fetishization of ‘paradise’ and critiques colonial and racist systems built upon the white supremacy and imperialism that overthrew Hawai’ian sovereignty. This work critiques the commodification of Hawai’i as an escape to an idealized paradise for tourists from overseas as well as the U.S. ‘mainland’. These videos and performances address the ways eco-tourism advertising mystifies neoliberal economic and political programs through the exploitation of Hawai’i’s resources, land, and peoples.

The performance ends with the birdsong of the Kauaʻi ʻōʻō last heard in the Hawai’i mountains in 1987. This work is made in the memory of the artist’s grandmother who died in 1987 in the warmth of her garden located in Kahuku (Oahu, HI) on the old sugar plantation retirement housing.

Watch the Live-stream Documentation on the Cambridge Bid FB here.