Super Inday: Sakdag Wellness & Art Exhibit

“Super Inday” Sakdag Arts for Wellness Exhibit is the offshoot of Palangga Prison Art; Triple Lockdown Showdown which started as Freedom in Prison passion project which evolved into a restorative social enterprise showcasing the artworks produced with the women artists as Persons Deprived of Liberty (PDL) in Iloilo City District Jail Female Dormitory in Iloilo City (ICDJFD) and Iloilo District Jail Female Dormitory (IDJFD), Pototan, Iloilo.

Can Prison be a healing place?  The main purpose of this culture-specific healing prison art project, is to reach out to the most vulnerable and marginalized population of women artists
badly affected by COVID-19 pandemic.  The process of using healing modalities is the reintroduction of community healing arts rooted in the indigenous skills, knowledge, and practices as part of the process in arts making expressed in the culture-specific contemporary form of representation, appropriation and expression.  During the COVID-19, the whole world experienced a sense of prison being locked down at home. In other corners of the world, the quarantine means double or triple lockdown such as the case of women artists in Philippine prison.  Triple Lockdown Showdown Project brings together artists breaking barriers and walls of prison with participating artists/volunteers/facilitators/ experts
from Iloilo to Manila, Cebu, Panggasinan, Cavite, Barcelona, Montreal, Toronto, and New York.

In response to the COVID19 pandemic, the SAKDAG art exhibit provides a beathing space where women who are seemingly invisible, voiceless, powerless, and marginalized are involved in psycho-social care-giving through arts as a survival tool kit expressed in the stories of objects.

Super Inday is a collective tapestry which flows in organic movement such as the birthing
of Inday with women stories as inner-architecture rebuild. Soft sculptures encapsulated stories of
objects mounted as multi-layered fabric tapestry installation resembles floating winged avatars as a
multi-dimensional womb altar. Handsewn sculpted mosquito net clothes are set as hanging
mobiles wood hangers. The iconic beaded womb sculpture in a form of a hommock and human
figure carries the personal stories of women in colorful vaginal sculptures as a powerful assertion
and defiance of women’s bodies resurrecting from the brokenness and abuse. Handwoven hablon
in hand-processed natural dyes and organic prints, hand painted and hand embroidered welcomes
you to an age-old tradition of women creativity handed for generations with a contemporary twist.
Hablon “sakto” contemporary “istorya sang kasanag sa sulod sang kadulom” employs the methods
“soksok-haboy-soksok-haboy” using symbols or lines as visual narrative in a form of play “tiko-tiko, gumon-gumon, samo-samo, buho-buho, suli-suli, laktaw-laktaw, bitin-bitin, higot-higot, libot-libot
and walis,walis” as am organic process.
Super Inday portraits are embroidered mounted in a tapestry collage. A sculptural altar
with cotton thread macrame holds the soft sculpture of Inday super powers hand-sculpted into
anting-anting. The sculpted pieces are symbolic gathering of broken pieces into one body as a
vehicle of stories where the invisible buried emotions, pains and wounds are expressed in art
objects creating a powerful, tangible, accessible dialogue in the present. The women express
symbolic representation of their painful life stories creating new colors in their darkest times.
Women earn as artists who continue to support their families as breadwinners mothering behind
bars.
Super Inday speaks of stories of pain, survival, resistance, and resilience. The women-
centered process of art-making evolved into a restorative social enterprise. Super Inday prison art
are iconic Ilongga artworks symbolic of inner architecture rebuild as psychosocial for rehabilitation
support for women artists behind bars. Enter the world of compassion where a woman who knows
love, is FREE. Super Indays’ weapon for survival is but love as the source of inner power as
anchor to much needed strength to continue mothering behind bars.

Sculpted and handsewn white mosquito net incorporates the women PDL portrait into a dress. The
art pieces portrays personal story, memory and symbolic meaning of comfort portraying a personal
sense of smell, touch, texture, taste, sound and emotions of prison experience interpreted into
white netting handsewn into designer clothes. Each designer clothes speaks of the woman PDL
stories of personal struggles, dreams and inspirations as embodied poetic vision of wholeness and
healing.

Super Inday is the symbolic soft sculpture flying doll avatars with wings of the women PDL super
powers expressed in bold red as the symbol of resilience, courage, life and breathe. Each woman
narrative expressed in every pair of wings and hands reconcile with their inner power and inner
strength which made them survive the darkest times. The colorful crowns “corona ni inday” is
iconic expression of reclaiming “her” position as a resilient woman who confronts the triple
lockdown with courage, dignity and creativity.

Altar ni Inday or “Altar of Inday” is a juxtaposition of several elements such as the
macramé altar installation, beaded hammock of dreams and a beautifully handmade sculpted
vaginas, and inday dolls made by the women artists behind bars resembling the “woman” – woman
of resilience. The altar bows to the each sacred woman whether scarred as mother (nanay), suffered as a sister (ate), neglected as a grandmother (lola), deprived as an aunt (tita) and isolated
as a friend (kaibigan). Women bodies are honored and respected.

The soft sculptures in hand-sculpted made of upcycled materials, embraces the innate power of a
woman like the mama carabao, hard worker, life-giving, strong horned resilient animal who at the
same time embodies gentleness and wisdom. The cactus-like plants are symbolic of survival in
harshest environments and the will to live as life-giving medicine.

The handmade soft sculptures are symbolic of personal power of protection and connection to
“her” ancestors and family spiritual values. The symbolic meanings were anchored from their inner
reflections of their “super power” or strength that “she” embodies influenced or inherited by
beloved, love ones or ancestors juxtaposed into a prayer altar, with reverence to sacredness,
wholeness, healing and ancestral heritage.