In this collection of videos, poet and former political detainee Axel Pinpin, Gabriela Rep. Liza Maza, lawyer Evalyn Ursua, and cultural artist Joel Garduce read poems duting the launching of a bar tour dubbed “Artists Arrest the VFA” on April 7 at the Conspiracy Bar in Quezon City. The event was organized by the Artists’ Response to the Call for Social Change and Transformation (Artists’ ARREST) and the Junk VFA Movement.
The second bar tour will be held on April 24 at Ten-02 Bar and on April 30 at Magnet Café, all in Quezon City.
The bar tour aims to voice out the growing clamor to junk the lopsided Visiting Forces Agreement through music, poems, performance arts and street paintings.
“Artists Arrest the VFA” will also be an occasion for the launch of a chapbook of poems, songs, and other artistic and literary works on the VFA.
Gabriela Rep. Liza Maza reads Lilia Quindoza-Santiago’s “Sa Ngalan ng Ina, ng Anak, ng Diwata’t Paraluman.”
Poet and former political prisoner Axel Pinpin recites “Ako ang Digmaan,” his translation of John T. Stigner’s “I am War.” Pinpin also reads his own poem with a similar theme.
Concerned Artists of the Philippines’ Joel Garduce performs Jose Maria Sison’s anti-imperialist poem “Birds of Prey.”
Lawyer Evalyn Ursua, former counsel of Subic rape victim ‘Nicole’, recites Joi’ Barrios’s “Pagtulay Sa Alambre (Isang Liham sa mga Filipina na Naninirahan sa Estados Unidos)”