“A Great Claw Looms”
Poster paint and plaster
2021
Personally the work speaks of an intense authoritarian force, people that will do anything to stomp out anyone who is against them. The claw, detached from what is going on with the animals below, comes in to terrorize them. The image came to me when I was comparing the Spanish and the police attacking students within the student campus. Both the police and Spaniards attacking grounds where the people within it are minding their own business.
The claw is both the police under the Marcos Administration and the Spaniards, the animals below are the inhabitants of pre-colonial Philippines and students within the Diliman campus.
An artist who has a penchant for strange creatures, Miles Fabonan’s improvised fauna spill across the lanscape, creating these rich pools of color. His works ranging from small humorous observations of everyday life to grandiose events reminiscient to the works of Hieronymus Bosch. Though the most recurring theme in his works is this sense of waiting and loneliness, which he explores both negative and positive aspects of.