Woven Threads

Exhibited at the Centre for Contemporary Photography, Melbourne in 1997 and at Gallery 4a in Sydney in 1998.
Components of this series were shown at Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery in 1998.

Commissioned by Community Aid Abroad

This body of work investigates specifically the place of women in two indigenous communities in the Philippines. The photographs explore these via traditional and contemporary photographic modes, the documentary, the ethnographic/ anthropological and the touristic raising questions about the limitations of these forms of representation. ‘…. Zahalka’s repetition of the image and signposting of its manipulability serve to foreground the constructedness to which the cultural is subject in the process of photography. Most effective is her critique of postcard photography, a genre which ossifies and commodifies cultural difference (more often than not the difference of subaltern ethnic groups), turning it into a hollowed-out sign of colourful and unique national identity’. 1 1 Carruthers, Ashley

Catalogue

Amada Tudal, 1997

Adilita Malilong, 1997

Alinda An’an, 1997

Elma Segundo, 1997

Goy Unga, 1997

Lisa Timban, 1997

Lorita Sailon,1997

Sendon Fungan, 1997

Pilsar Ongna and Tagaling Akil
Ethnographic

T’boli elder, 1997

T’boli woman (airing fire) , 1997

T’boli woman in traditional costume, 1997

Woman in field, 1997

Manobo girl (with mortar and pestle) , 1997

Manobo woman (carrying water) , 1997

Manobo tribal woman, 1997

Manobo woman (with mortar and pestle) , 1997

Postcards

Postcard 1

Postcard 2

Postcard 3

Postcard 4

Postcard 5

Postcard 6

Postcard 7

Postcard 8

Postcard 9