Silverlens, in partnership with Times Square Arts, is pleased to present Our Islands 11°16’58.4” N 123°45’07.0”E by Dutch-Filipino artist Martha Atienza, as part of Times Square Arts’ celebrated Midnight Moment series. Screened nightly throughout July 2024, from 11:57 pm to midnight, the acclaimed video work—which takes the form of a dreamlike underwater rendition of a parade originating from the artist’s native Philippines—illuminates the artist’s practice which documents and interrogates pressing issues surrounding both community and the environment.

“Showcasing Our Islands as part of Times Square Arts' Midnight Moment in New York is an exciting chance to bring this piece to a global audience in a unique setting. I want to take this opportunity to amplify urgent environmental and social challenges faced on our island home of Bantayan and the Philippines,” said Martha Atienza. “This brief, powerful moment brings attention to issues around the complexities of climate change while underscoring the intersection between environmental and cultural loss and resiliency.”

In Our Islands, Atienza reimagines a yearly local parade from her native Philippines by staging it on the floor of the Visayan Sea. The film’s performers are underwater compressor divers from Bantayan Island, who use plastic hose pipes to breathe while over one hundred feet under the water surface. Known as the world’s most dangerous form of fishing, compressor diving is necessitated by the devastating impact of commercial fishing, industrialization, and climate change in the archipelago. The exact coordinates for the dreamlike underwater procession were chosen by the divers themselves according to the tide, current, and time of day. As they trudge across the seabed, Atienza’s cast of characters and choice of setting not only present a critical and humorous take on society and culture in the Philippines, but also allude to the threat of climate collapse to which Southeast Asia is increasingly exposed.

Bridging local cultural traditions and histories of migration, labor, and resilience in the Philippine archipelago, as well as broader existential concerns, Atienza’s Our Islands probes the transformative
power of art in instigating social change. Part of her continuing series to establish art as an open source for ideas, Atienza’s moving diorama under the sea is a collaboration with the local community, with whom she creates work to empower and amplify seldom-heard voices. In addition to her art practice, Atienza is the president and co-founder of GOODLand, a platform under her Art Lab that develops and applies a creative and collaborative methodology to tackle social, economic, and environmental issues on Bantayan Island in the Visayas, Philippines. Its mission is to facilitate the realization of an empowered, self-sufficient, and resilient community.

The original 72-minute film, Our Islands 11°16’58.4”N 123°45’07.0”E, was awarded the esteemed Baloise Art Prize at Art Basel in 2017 and acquired by the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi in 2022. The work has previously screened across Asia, Australia, and Europe. Now showing nightly on the island of Manhattan, the film invites viewers to reflect on their own role within the ecological and societal concerns documented, challenging them to consider their impact on the environment and their connection to the earth.

Martha Atienza is a Philippine-based artist whose video work documents issues of the environment, community, and development within her island home. Her observational lens takes on both ecological and sociological concerns as she studies the intricate interplay between local traditions, human subjectivity, and the natural world. By deeply examining the patterns within her immediate surroundings, Atienza explores the potential that the video medium holds as a catalyst for societal transformation. She was twice awarded the Ateneo Art Awards in Manila (2012/2016) and the Cultural Center of the Philippines Thirteen Artists Award (2015). Recent biennials and triennials include the 2nd Diriyah Contemporary Art Biennale, Riyadh (2024); 17th Istanbul Biennial, Istanbul (2022); Bangkok Art Biennale, Bangkok (2020); Honolulu Biennial, Oahu, Hawaii (2019); and the 9th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Brisbane (2018). In addition to her art practice, Atienza is the president and co-founder of the NGO GOODLand.

Times Square Arts, the public art program of the Times Square Alliance, collaborates with contemporary artists and cultural institutions to experiment and engage with one of the world's most iconic urban places. Through the Square's electronic billboards, public plazas, vacant areas and popular venues, and the Alliance's own online landscape, Times Square Arts invites leading contemporary creators, such as Charles Gaines, Joan Jonas, Jeffrey Gibson, Pamela Council, Mel Chin and Kehinde Wiley, to help the public see Times Square in new ways. Times Square has always been a cultural district and place of risk, innovation and creativity, and the arts program ensures these qualities remain central to the district's unique identity.